Fin Greenall, who is the voice and heart behind Fink, often gets mistaken for other people.

At the BMI Awards in the US, a ‘roomful of gangstas and playas’ were
convinced the Cornwall-born, Bristol-raised Englishman was a lawyer, and
not a songwriter picking up an ‘American Urban’ gong – one of three
BMIs he received for his work with John Legend on the soul singer’s
Evolver album.

In Berlin, clubbing capital of the world, they think he helps run a
small minimal techno label. In certain London circles he’s known as the
hardworking insider whose past roles at DefJam, Sony Music, Talkin’
Loud, and Source saw him work with a range of artists longer than the
horizon. At the BBC, they imagine Fink as perhaps the only musician who
has played both the Electric Proms and the actual Proms (was that really
the same guy leading a 120-piece orchestra at the Royal Albert Hall in
an ‘immense’ cover of Roy Ayers’ Everybody Loves The Sunshine?).

In record company circles, he’s the producer who worked on the first
demos by Amy Winehouse and the writer who’s been crafting hooks for
Professor Green. In big-room booths around the world, he’s the
internationally-renowned DJ and Ninja Tune stalwart who finally hung up
his Sennheisers with a valedictory set at London’s Fabric in 2003. ‘My
skillset just seemed so old compared to these guys that could DJ for six
hours without one high-hat out of place using Ableton or something,’ he
notes admiringly.

Who is Fin Greenall? All of the above.

Yes, the now-Brighton-based musician acknowledges, he has done – does do
– all of those things. ‘But none of that is as important as how I feel
when I write songs like "Fear is Like Fire" and "Perfect Darkness". The Fink
thing is my main thing.’

As a kid, the one thing of his dad’s that Fin Greenall wasn’t allowed to
touch was the old Martin acoustic guitar. ‘It was his one possession
where he said, “everything in this house is owned by everybody – apart
from that.”’ But with age – and the burgeoning of his son’s skills as a
player – came a relaxation of the exclusion zone: Greenall plays the
Martin on the punchy, Jeff Buckley-covering-Radiohead-esque "Fear Is Like
Fire". It’s sure to become a live stand-out on Fink’s upcoming,
18-month-long world tour. ‘It’s all about trying to look at fear and be
optimistic – you can be really negative or fucking embrace it and use
it.

‘The great thing about growing up in a house where music is a big
factor,’ he continues, ‘was the fact that music being part of your life
was a perfectly natural thing.’

Music, it seems, became more than that: it was Greenall’s life. He
hoovered up the sounds he heard on John Peel: ‘The Cure, The Smiths, The
Orb, African music, Japanese hardcore’. He embraced skateboarding, the
music and the fashion – ‘it was an awesome way to grow your own
culture’. At university in Leeds, electronic and dance music became
everything.

‘It was definitely about wanting to be part of a revolution that I could
call my own,’ he recalls. ‘A couple of friends and I clubbed together
our student loans and bought equipment to make ambient techno – we were
really inspired by Aphex Twin and The Orb and Moby. We were amazed at
how fucking easy it was to make ambient techno. It wasn’t easy to make
good ambient techno,’ he laughs. ‘But it was easy enough to make techno
good enough to get us signed after six months of mucking around at uni.’

The young techno warrior was messianic.

‘I thought the song was dead, the chorus was dead, playing drums and
guitar and bass was so old-school and outdated and why would you want to
do that? Dylan did that 50 years ago! We should be part of this new
revolution, instrumentalism, acid house, rave culture, techno – this
stuff is a brave new avant-garde frontier and you should be involved.’

His ardour and his skills saw Greenall become part of the Ninja Tune
family – first signed on the back of a cassette-tape demo - as artist,
DJ, writer, producer, and remixer.

‘Brilliant times,’ he sighs nostalgically. ‘Sometimes you’d just have to
pinch yourself. Then, other times, you wake up in Bratislava on a
Tuesday morning and you’re reminded that there is hard work to all of
this.’ All that crate-digging wasn’t all it’s cracked up to be either:
‘You can’t be shit!’ Greenall grins. ‘And because of the community that
Ninja has worldwide, if you are shit everybody knows about it the next
day. Eight years of DJing have given me an obscenely huge record
collection. I just cleared out the breaks section – four crates of
twelves that were total pony!’

So the wheels of steel started to fall off.

‘It wasn’t until I’d run that right the way through to its natural
conclusion – I’m an international DJ on the biggest DJ label in the
world – that I thought: I’m kinda over it. And it was actually working
with a young artist straight out of school called Amy Winehouse that
inspired me to go, “wow, songs are great! Now I get how difficult it is,
and how much talent there is involved in this. It’s more of a challenge
than clubbing.”’

Greenall melted down his turntables and recast them as a guitar and a
stool. Metaphorically speaking. His parents were pleased. ‘My career
only made sense to them when I picked up a guitar and started to sing,’
he says. ‘All of a sudden I was doing music, I wasn’t just mucking
around. But in my rave days, DJing techno and breaks, they didn’t get
that at all. That’s probably why I did it in the first place.

‘But I realised: if your music had songs in it, it had a much greater
reach. Not in business terms, but if a singer of, say, Amy’s calibre
sings over this beat, it becomes so much bigger than just a beat. I
can’t get rid of my clubbing past, not that I’d want to. But the linear
nature of some of my music is definitely because of all those years
spent clubbing and DJing, when a very simple idea can make the best club
record. And it’s the same with songs – I’m after a really simple riff
or really simple lyric or melody. And it’s about keeping that beautiful
moment going for as long as you can.’

Fin Greenall, who is the voice and heart behind Fink, often gets mistaken for other people.

At the BMI Awards in the US, a ‘roomful of gangstas and playas’ were
convinced the Cornwall-born, Bristol-raised Englishman was a lawyer, and
not a songwriter picking up an ‘American Urban’ gong – one of three
BMIs he received for his work with John Legend on the soul singer’s
Evolver album.

In Berlin, clubbing capital of the world, they think he helps run a
small minimal techno label. In certain London circles he’s known as the
hardworking insider whose past roles at DefJam, Sony Music, Talkin’
Loud, and Source saw him work with a range of artists longer than the
horizon. At the BBC, they imagine Fink as perhaps the only musician who
has played both the Electric Proms and the actual Proms (was that really
the same guy leading a 120-piece orchestra at the Royal Albert Hall in
an ‘immense’ cover of Roy Ayers’ Everybody Loves The Sunshine?).

In record company circles, he’s the producer who worked on the first
demos by Amy Winehouse and the writer who’s been crafting hooks for
Professor Green. In big-room booths around the world, he’s the
internationally-renowned DJ and Ninja Tune stalwart who finally hung up
his Sennheisers with a valedictory set at London’s Fabric in 2003. ‘My
skillset just seemed so old compared to these guys that could DJ for six
hours without one high-hat out of place using Ableton or something,’ he
notes admiringly.

Who is Fin Greenall? All of the above.

Yes, the now-Brighton-based musician acknowledges, he has done – does do
– all of those things. ‘But none of that is as important as how I feel
when I write songs like "Fear is Like Fire" and "Perfect Darkness". The Fink
thing is my main thing.’

As a kid, the one thing of his dad’s that Fin Greenall wasn’t allowed to
touch was the old Martin acoustic guitar. ‘It was his one possession
where he said, “everything in this house is owned by everybody – apart
from that.”’ But with age – and the burgeoning of his son’s skills as a
player – came a relaxation of the exclusion zone: Greenall plays the
Martin on the punchy, Jeff Buckley-covering-Radiohead-esque "Fear Is Like
Fire". It’s sure to become a live stand-out on Fink’s upcoming,
18-month-long world tour. ‘It’s all about trying to look at fear and be
optimistic – you can be really negative or fucking embrace it and use
it.

‘The great thing about growing up in a house where music is a big
factor,’ he continues, ‘was the fact that music being part of your life
was a perfectly natural thing.’

Music, it seems, became more than that: it was Greenall’s life. He
hoovered up the sounds he heard on John Peel: ‘The Cure, The Smiths, The
Orb, African music, Japanese hardcore’. He embraced skateboarding, the
music and the fashion – ‘it was an awesome way to grow your own
culture’. At university in Leeds, electronic and dance music became
everything.

‘It was definitely about wanting to be part of a revolution that I could
call my own,’ he recalls. ‘A couple of friends and I clubbed together
our student loans and bought equipment to make ambient techno – we were
really inspired by Aphex Twin and The Orb and Moby. We were amazed at
how fucking easy it was to make ambient techno. It wasn’t easy to make
good ambient techno,’ he laughs. ‘But it was easy enough to make techno
good enough to get us signed after six months of mucking around at uni.’

The young techno warrior was messianic.

‘I thought the song was dead, the chorus was dead, playing drums and
guitar and bass was so old-school and outdated and why would you want to
do that? Dylan did that 50 years ago! We should be part of this new
revolution, instrumentalism, acid house, rave culture, techno – this
stuff is a brave new avant-garde frontier and you should be involved.’

His ardour and his skills saw Greenall become part of the Ninja Tune
family – first signed on the back of a cassette-tape demo - as artist,
DJ, writer, producer, and remixer.

‘Brilliant times,’ he sighs nostalgically. ‘Sometimes you’d just have to
pinch yourself. Then, other times, you wake up in Bratislava on a
Tuesday morning and you’re reminded that there is hard work to all of
this.’ All that crate-digging wasn’t all it’s cracked up to be either:
‘You can’t be shit!’ Greenall grins. ‘And because of the community that
Ninja has worldwide, if you are shit everybody knows about it the next
day. Eight years of DJing have given me an obscenely huge record
collection. I just cleared out the breaks section – four crates of
twelves that were total pony!’

So the wheels of steel started to fall off.

‘It wasn’t until I’d run that right the way through to its natural
conclusion – I’m an international DJ on the biggest DJ label in the
world – that I thought: I’m kinda over it. And it was actually working
with a young artist straight out of school called Amy Winehouse that
inspired me to go, “wow, songs are great! Now I get how difficult it is,
and how much talent there is involved in this. It’s more of a challenge
than clubbing.”’

Greenall melted down his turntables and recast them as a guitar and a
stool. Metaphorically speaking. His parents were pleased. ‘My career
only made sense to them when I picked up a guitar and started to sing,’
he says. ‘All of a sudden I was doing music, I wasn’t just mucking
around. But in my rave days, DJing techno and breaks, they didn’t get
that at all. That’s probably why I did it in the first place.

‘But I realised: if your music had songs in it, it had a much greater
reach. Not in business terms, but if a singer of, say, Amy’s calibre
sings over this beat, it becomes so much bigger than just a beat. I
can’t get rid of my clubbing past, not that I’d want to. But the linear
nature of some of my music is definitely because of all those years
spent clubbing and DJing, when a very simple idea can make the best club
record. And it’s the same with songs – I’m after a really simple riff
or really simple lyric or melody. And it’s about keeping that beautiful
moment going for as long as you can.’

Helena Hauff returns to Werkdiscs/Ninja Tune with a 5-track EP Lex Tertia - her first for the imprint since 2013's Actio Reactio. Released 30th March 2015 on 12" and digital formats. In her won words: "Lex Tertia is a further exploration into the idea of grimy, sonically crushed, dysfunctional, insane stuff that kicks on where Actio Reactio left off."

Helena Hauff returns to Werkdiscs/Ninja Tune with a 5-track EP Lex Tertia - her first for the imprint since 2013's Actio Reactio. Released 30th March 2015 on 12" and digital formats. In her won words: "Lex Tertia is a further exploration into the idea of grimy, sonically crushed, dysfunctional, insane stuff that kicks on where Actio Reactio left off."

In 2012, a striking new voice emerged from the wider surge of electronic music in the U.S. ODESZA’s Summer’s Gone stood out from the crowd; it was a collection of songs, not just beats; and its irresistible, startling dreaminess, addictive drums and fathoms-deep bass set it apart from the by-the-numbers brutality of EDM’s also-rans. In an age of manufactured internet buzz and carefully plotted hype, ODESZA’s story was refreshingly authentic: A brilliant new duo unveiled their music on the internet, and the world paid attention.

Harrison Mills (aka CatacombKid) and Clayton Knight (aka BeachesBeaches) began recording together after meeting at Western Washington University. There was instant chemistry, and the pair worked prolifically, quickly carving out a distinctive, heady sound: glitched-out vocals, soaring, visceral melody and ear-gripping drums. Two songs from Summer’s Gone – “How Did I Get Here” and “iPlayYouListen” – instantly leapt to number 1 on the Hype Machine Popular Chart. ODESZA began to make evangelical fans, with word of their music setting the world – both real and virtual – alight.

2013 saw the release of the My Friends Never Die EP, with three of the five tracks hitting #1 on Hype Machine. Relentless touring followed, including dates with Pretty Lights and Emancipator and numerous festival performances including Sasquatch Music Festival and Lightning In A Bottle. Thrown in at the deep end, ODESZA quickly honed a live craft to match that of their recordings.

The duo was playing to larger and larger crowds when Pretty Lights asked them to be the support act on the fall Pretty Lights tour, and to remix "One Day They'll Know," which also hit #1 on Hype Machine and #8 on the iTunes Electronic Chart. Later in 2013, ODESZA selected their favourite producers for a follow up remix EP, My Friends Never Die Remixes, and launched the ambitious, ongoing mixtape series NO.SLEEP.

February 2014 brought the release of the ODESZA single “Sun Models (feat. Madelyn Grant,)” taken from the duo’s forthcoming second album. This song continued the trend they’d set previously, and it too hit #1 on Hype Machine. In March 2014 ODESZA’s remix of Pretty Lights’ “Lost And Found” was released on the DIVERGENT movie soundtrack, and (you guessed it!) hit #1 on Hype Machine.

Harrison and Clayton headed back into the studio, putting the finishes touches to their forthcoming second album, before setting out on a sold out North American tour in Spring, culminating in a performance at Coachella. Not wanting to leave their growing legion of fans wanting, the duo’s remix of ZHU’s hit “Faded” was released, taking their #1s on the Hype Machine chart straight into double figures.

Summer 2014 saw ODESZA visit Australia to play a series of live dates, before heading back to North America for festivals, and to polish up and master their now hotly anticipated sophomore album.

And finally that brand new album is here. In Return has more than just delivered on the promise of ODESZA’s previous work. A record with a precocious maturity and coherence, it’s a start-to-finish stunner of pop-infused, electronic wonder, littered with infectious hooks and potent atmosphere. Vocal performances from Zyra, Py and Shy Girls accompany that of Madelyn Grant on Sun Models, expertly worked into ODESZA’s trademark, mood-altering uplift.

ODESZA developed a new live performance to accompany In Return, ensuring that the shows do full justice to the album. Their work ethic and constant evolution resulted in a sold out headline tour of North America this fall and has set them up for a successful first European tour. 2015 brings an even more ambitious live production which ODESZA will unveil at every major music festival across the United States.

One of the stunning aspects of ODESZA is the speed with which they’ve created a large, devoted fanbase – testament to just how refreshing, immediate and exciting their music is. To date, ODESZA has earned 16 Hype Machine #1s, amassed over 35 million SoundCloud streams and 15.3 million Spotify plays in the last 60 days, and been licensed by Adidas, GoPro, Piz Buin and many more. In Return debuted at #1 on the Billboard Electronic chart, #42 on the Billboard Top 200 chart, # 1 on the iTunes Electronic Chart where it spent 15 days in a row, cracked the iTunes Electronic Chart Top 10 in 7 other countries outside the U.S., and reached #20 on the iTunes Overall Albums chart. Their breakout single, "Say My Name (feat. Zyra)," reached #1 on the Hype Machine popular chart twice, #1 on the Spotify US Viral Chart, #2 on the Spotify Global Chart and was named iTunes Single of the Week in many countries around the globe. The “Say My Name” video was named a Vimeo staff pick and saw airplay on MTV Hits, MTVU and Fuse. ODESZA has also been commissioned to make remixes for Charli XCX, Angus & Julia Stone and many more to come.

That’s a lot of people paying attention! In Return is everything fans might have hoped for and then some: An album that places ODESZA firmly in the vanguard of electronic music’s coming of age.

“Despite the many voices featured on the album, the sound is unified under a groove, built on ODESZA’s multi-layered melodies, spaced-out beats and cinematic charm.” - TIME

“Every track off of their latest album In Return hangs between blithe, ethereal spaces and thumping percussion, like fuzzy clouds punctuated by dope-ass thunder. The duo keep things unpredictable, never relying on same beat for too long, their music making you feel as if you’re being teleported into the future that's nostalgic for the past.” - Noisey

“Mixed in with their classic approach are a number of choice guest appearances and snazzy experiments that push the limits of their sound.” - Seattle Times

“There’s a certain finger-on-the-pulse feeling with ODESZA. Their grasp on the direction of electronic music sets them apart and they’re becoming the gold standard of acts born from sounds exchanged on the internet.” - Paste Magazine

“ODESZA has already demonstrated the ability to take root in the future and garage house genre as a power team to watch, and continues to showcase their forward thinking ear for the genre’s sound.” - Dancing Astronaut

In 2012, a striking new voice emerged from the wider surge of electronic music in the U.S. ODESZA’s Summer’s Gone stood out from the crowd; it was a collection of songs, not just beats; and its irresistible, startling dreaminess, addictive drums and fathoms-deep bass set it apart from the by-the-numbers brutality of EDM’s also-rans. In an age of manufactured internet buzz and carefully plotted hype, ODESZA’s story was refreshingly authentic: A brilliant new duo unveiled their music on the internet, and the world paid attention.

Harrison Mills (aka CatacombKid) and Clayton Knight (aka BeachesBeaches) began recording together after meeting at Western Washington University. There was instant chemistry, and the pair worked prolifically, quickly carving out a distinctive, heady sound: glitched-out vocals, soaring, visceral melody and ear-gripping drums. Two songs from Summer’s Gone – “How Did I Get Here” and “iPlayYouListen” – instantly leapt to number 1 on the Hype Machine Popular Chart. ODESZA began to make evangelical fans, with word of their music setting the world – both real and virtual – alight.

2013 saw the release of the My Friends Never Die EP, with three of the five tracks hitting #1 on Hype Machine. Relentless touring followed, including dates with Pretty Lights and Emancipator and numerous festival performances including Sasquatch Music Festival and Lightning In A Bottle. Thrown in at the deep end, ODESZA quickly honed a live craft to match that of their recordings.

The duo was playing to larger and larger crowds when Pretty Lights asked them to be the support act on the fall Pretty Lights tour, and to remix "One Day They'll Know," which also hit #1 on Hype Machine and #8 on the iTunes Electronic Chart. Later in 2013, ODESZA selected their favourite producers for a follow up remix EP, My Friends Never Die Remixes, and launched the ambitious, ongoing mixtape series NO.SLEEP.

February 2014 brought the release of the ODESZA single “Sun Models (feat. Madelyn Grant,)” taken from the duo’s forthcoming second album. This song continued the trend they’d set previously, and it too hit #1 on Hype Machine. In March 2014 ODESZA’s remix of Pretty Lights’ “Lost And Found” was released on the DIVERGENT movie soundtrack, and (you guessed it!) hit #1 on Hype Machine.

Harrison and Clayton headed back into the studio, putting the finishes touches to their forthcoming second album, before setting out on a sold out North American tour in Spring, culminating in a performance at Coachella. Not wanting to leave their growing legion of fans wanting, the duo’s remix of ZHU’s hit “Faded” was released, taking their #1s on the Hype Machine chart straight into double figures.

Summer 2014 saw ODESZA visit Australia to play a series of live dates, before heading back to North America for festivals, and to polish up and master their now hotly anticipated sophomore album.

And finally that brand new album is here. In Return has more than just delivered on the promise of ODESZA’s previous work. A record with a precocious maturity and coherence, it’s a start-to-finish stunner of pop-infused, electronic wonder, littered with infectious hooks and potent atmosphere. Vocal performances from Zyra, Py and Shy Girls accompany that of Madelyn Grant on Sun Models, expertly worked into ODESZA’s trademark, mood-altering uplift.

ODESZA developed a new live performance to accompany In Return, ensuring that the shows do full justice to the album. Their work ethic and constant evolution resulted in a sold out headline tour of North America this fall and has set them up for a successful first European tour. 2015 brings an even more ambitious live production which ODESZA will unveil at every major music festival across the United States.

One of the stunning aspects of ODESZA is the speed with which they’ve created a large, devoted fanbase – testament to just how refreshing, immediate and exciting their music is. To date, ODESZA has earned 16 Hype Machine #1s, amassed over 35 million SoundCloud streams and 15.3 million Spotify plays in the last 60 days, and been licensed by Adidas, GoPro, Piz Buin and many more. In Return debuted at #1 on the Billboard Electronic chart, #42 on the Billboard Top 200 chart, # 1 on the iTunes Electronic Chart where it spent 15 days in a row, cracked the iTunes Electronic Chart Top 10 in 7 other countries outside the U.S., and reached #20 on the iTunes Overall Albums chart. Their breakout single, "Say My Name (feat. Zyra)," reached #1 on the Hype Machine popular chart twice, #1 on the Spotify US Viral Chart, #2 on the Spotify Global Chart and was named iTunes Single of the Week in many countries around the globe. The “Say My Name” video was named a Vimeo staff pick and saw airplay on MTV Hits, MTVU and Fuse. ODESZA has also been commissioned to make remixes for Charli XCX, Angus & Julia Stone and many more to come.

That’s a lot of people paying attention! In Return is everything fans might have hoped for and then some: An album that places ODESZA firmly in the vanguard of electronic music’s coming of age.

“Despite the many voices featured on the album, the sound is unified under a groove, built on ODESZA’s multi-layered melodies, spaced-out beats and cinematic charm.” - TIME

“Every track off of their latest album In Return hangs between blithe, ethereal spaces and thumping percussion, like fuzzy clouds punctuated by dope-ass thunder. The duo keep things unpredictable, never relying on same beat for too long, their music making you feel as if you’re being teleported into the future that's nostalgic for the past.” - Noisey

“Mixed in with their classic approach are a number of choice guest appearances and snazzy experiments that push the limits of their sound.” - Seattle Times

“There’s a certain finger-on-the-pulse feeling with ODESZA. Their grasp on the direction of electronic music sets them apart and they’re becoming the gold standard of acts born from sounds exchanged on the internet.” - Paste Magazine

“ODESZA has already demonstrated the ability to take root in the future and garage house genre as a power team to watch, and continues to showcase their forward thinking ear for the genre’s sound.” - Dancing Astronaut

In 2012, a striking new voice emerged from the wider surge of electronic music in the U.S. ODESZA’s Summer’s Gone stood out from the crowd; it was a collection of songs, not just beats; and its irresistible, startling dreaminess, addictive drums and fathoms-deep bass set it apart from the by-the-numbers brutality of EDM’s also-rans. In an age of manufactured internet buzz and carefully plotted hype, ODESZA’s story was refreshingly authentic: A brilliant new duo unveiled their music on the internet, and the world paid attention.

Harrison Mills (aka CatacombKid) and Clayton Knight (aka BeachesBeaches) began recording together after meeting at Western Washington University. There was instant chemistry, and the pair worked prolifically, quickly carving out a distinctive, heady sound: glitched-out vocals, soaring, visceral melody and ear-gripping drums. Two songs from Summer’s Gone – “How Did I Get Here” and “iPlayYouListen” – instantly leapt to number 1 on the Hype Machine Popular Chart. ODESZA began to make evangelical fans, with word of their music setting the world – both real and virtual – alight.

2013 saw the release of the My Friends Never Die EP, with three of the five tracks hitting #1 on Hype Machine. Relentless touring followed, including dates with Pretty Lights and Emancipator and numerous festival performances including Sasquatch Music Festival and Lightning In A Bottle. Thrown in at the deep end, ODESZA quickly honed a live craft to match that of their recordings.

The duo was playing to larger and larger crowds when Pretty Lights asked them to be the support act on the fall Pretty Lights tour, and to remix "One Day They'll Know," which also hit #1 on Hype Machine and #8 on the iTunes Electronic Chart. Later in 2013, ODESZA selected their favourite producers for a follow up remix EP, My Friends Never Die Remixes, and launched the ambitious, ongoing mixtape series NO.SLEEP.

February 2014 brought the release of the ODESZA single “Sun Models (feat. Madelyn Grant,)” taken from the duo’s forthcoming second album. This song continued the trend they’d set previously, and it too hit #1 on Hype Machine. In March 2014 ODESZA’s remix of Pretty Lights’ “Lost And Found” was released on the DIVERGENT movie soundtrack, and (you guessed it!) hit #1 on Hype Machine.

Harrison and Clayton headed back into the studio, putting the finishes touches to their forthcoming second album, before setting out on a sold out North American tour in Spring, culminating in a performance at Coachella. Not wanting to leave their growing legion of fans wanting, the duo’s remix of ZHU’s hit “Faded” was released, taking their #1s on the Hype Machine chart straight into double figures.

Summer 2014 saw ODESZA visit Australia to play a series of live dates, before heading back to North America for festivals, and to polish up and master their now hotly anticipated sophomore album.

And finally that brand new album is here. In Return has more than just delivered on the promise of ODESZA’s previous work. A record with a precocious maturity and coherence, it’s a start-to-finish stunner of pop-infused, electronic wonder, littered with infectious hooks and potent atmosphere. Vocal performances from Zyra, Py and Shy Girls accompany that of Madelyn Grant on Sun Models, expertly worked into ODESZA’s trademark, mood-altering uplift.

ODESZA developed a new live performance to accompany In Return, ensuring that the shows do full justice to the album. Their work ethic and constant evolution resulted in a sold out headline tour of North America this fall and has set them up for a successful first European tour. 2015 brings an even more ambitious live production which ODESZA will unveil at every major music festival across the United States.

One of the stunning aspects of ODESZA is the speed with which they’ve created a large, devoted fanbase – testament to just how refreshing, immediate and exciting their music is. To date, ODESZA has earned 16 Hype Machine #1s, amassed over 35 million SoundCloud streams and 15.3 million Spotify plays in the last 60 days, and been licensed by Adidas, GoPro, Piz Buin and many more. In Return debuted at #1 on the Billboard Electronic chart, #42 on the Billboard Top 200 chart, # 1 on the iTunes Electronic Chart where it spent 15 days in a row, cracked the iTunes Electronic Chart Top 10 in 7 other countries outside the U.S., and reached #20 on the iTunes Overall Albums chart. Their breakout single, "Say My Name (feat. Zyra)," reached #1 on the Hype Machine popular chart twice, #1 on the Spotify US Viral Chart, #2 on the Spotify Global Chart and was named iTunes Single of the Week in many countries around the globe. The “Say My Name” video was named a Vimeo staff pick and saw airplay on MTV Hits, MTVU and Fuse. ODESZA has also been commissioned to make remixes for Charli XCX, Angus & Julia Stone and many more to come.

That’s a lot of people paying attention! In Return is everything fans might have hoped for and then some: An album that places ODESZA firmly in the vanguard of electronic music’s coming of age.

“Despite the many voices featured on the album, the sound is unified under a groove, built on ODESZA’s multi-layered melodies, spaced-out beats and cinematic charm.” - TIME

“Every track off of their latest album In Return hangs between blithe, ethereal spaces and thumping percussion, like fuzzy clouds punctuated by dope-ass thunder. The duo keep things unpredictable, never relying on same beat for too long, their music making you feel as if you’re being teleported into the future that's nostalgic for the past.” - Noisey

“Mixed in with their classic approach are a number of choice guest appearances and snazzy experiments that push the limits of their sound.” - Seattle Times

“There’s a certain finger-on-the-pulse feeling with ODESZA. Their grasp on the direction of electronic music sets them apart and they’re becoming the gold standard of acts born from sounds exchanged on the internet.” - Paste Magazine

“ODESZA has already demonstrated the ability to take root in the future and garage house genre as a power team to watch, and continues to showcase their forward thinking ear for the genre’s sound.” - Dancing Astronaut

Kieren Gallear aka DELS is a new type of rapper (which is another way of saying that he’s more than just a rapper). Applying the kind of attention to detail, micro-management and macro-vision which Jay-Z used to build a business empire, DELS makes art. Popular art mind you, but art all the same, an album of emotional peaks, musical innovation and surreal, brilliant lyrics, held together by a strong, unique vision.

Gallear “never set out to be a rapper. It just happened. I was always obsessed with words. I was always cutting out random letterforms from newspapers or books because I liked the way that they sat on the page visually. This lead to me scribbling random thoughts into the back of school books and eventually picking up the mic to record those thoughts on a beat. I loved the freedom of how words can sit together in hip hop.”

An early break came when Suffolk resident John Peel heard DELS and his crew rapping at a local event and asked them to come on to his show on Radio 1. Ten years later and Gallear was back recording a session for the DJ’s spiritual heir at the station, Huw Stephens. But the intervening decade wasn’t wasted on selling weed, or unemployment, or running with a gang or any of the cliches of “urban” music. In his methodical, thoughtful way, Gallear put his efforts into his education. “Studying illustration, film, photography and Graphic Design. Attempting to forge a career within the arts, which then led to me combining it all with my music. ‘I’d been working on GOB since 2007, behind the scenes,” he says of his 2011 debut LP.

Gallear worked with three complementary but very different producers on his debut album. One of the people listening in on that Peel session was Joe Goddard, then of an unknown band called Hot Chip. He got in touch and the two began working together, cementing a friendship which finds its pinnacle in their collaborations on GOB. Micachu, on the other hand, is best known for her work with her band The Shapes, their classification as “indie” largely ignoring her classical training and long-term interest in grime. Kwes, recently signed to Warp Records in his own right, has worked with Damon Albarn, The XX, The Invisible and Speech Debelle. “They all provided me with challenging, but very inspiring music that enabled me to roam free creatively,” DELS explains. “Kwes, Joe Goddard and Micachu helped me shape a sound that is very difficult to box within one specific genre tag, which is exactly what I wanted with that album. I wanted the music to take on a life of it’s own. And not take itself too seriously!”

After the record's release, Gallear went on the road with a three piece band which completely re-wrote the rules of live hip hop, finding a sound which was as near to New Order as it was to the Roots. He has toured all over Europe, playing festivals and clubs and developing further his reputation for a kind of emotional openness which is pretty much unique in hip hop. Over the last few months, DELS has begun to work furiously on a new album. The Black Salad EP, which received repeat plays from Zane Lowe, Annie Mac and Huw Stephens at Radio 1, is a taster of what's to come. Lead track Bird Milk made its debut in an earlier form on the Kwesachu Volume 2 mixtape and DELS is keeping the same core of collaborators while reaching out to new producers for his second album.

That album is now complete. A stunning consolidation of everything that makes DELS great, as well as a giant leap forward sonically and imaginatively, Petals Have Fallen is an ultra-modern hip-hop masterpiece.

Kwes took a more hands-on, directorial role on this record, stepping forward to executive produce the album. Other collaborators represent the renaissance of fruitful, purposeful experimental music that’s come of age in London of late. Rosie Lowe, singer, songwriter and instrumentalist, recently signed to Paul Epworth’s Wolf Tone label, lends her shimmering vocal skill to the starkly beautiful Burning Beaches. Micachu, fresh from creating one of the most startling and effective soundtracks of recent years for Jonathan Glazer’s Under the Skin, re-appears to lend her inimitable, visceral sonic genius to standout RGB.

South London avant-songstress Kerry Leatham has one of the finest voices and most original approaches to her craft that the capital has produced in recent years - she lends her considerable talent to Pulls. Add electronic music powerhouse and Ninja Tune legend Bonobo into the mix, as well as Mizz Beats, Eli-T and Kwes’ brilliant younger brother Coby Sey, and Kwes had a potent arsenal of musicians at his executive producer’s fingertips.

The album was recorded and produced in Kwes’ shipping container studio in London’s docklands, over a period of 18 months. Most of the actual writing took place in DELS’ flat in Peckham. ‘I found it difficult to write during the day,’ DELS says. ‘The songs always seemed to come together late at night as I laid bed, writing down my thoughts on my phone.’ Though this may have been a tortuous method for the writer, it’s an approach that’s delivered in spades for the listener. Petals Have Fallen is imbued with a late-night, soul-baring intimacy that’s rare on any sort of album, let alone in hip-hop. Like all the best records, the album is a self-contained universe, a window into DELS world that draws you gratefully in.

The album is also highly visual, casually littered with striking images. ‘The most ritualistic thing I did whilst I wrote the songs was pinning up visuals around me for inspiration. I’d often have movies that have meant so much to me over the years, like Akira, Blade Runner, Alien and The Shining, on in the background with no sound,’ DELS says. ‘I also had a few of my own landscape portraits and illustrations pinned up on the walls too.’

Petals Have Fallen is one of the first classic albums from a scene of musicians that has been years in the making, and marks a true resurgence of artistically worthwhile but viscerally thrilling music from London.

"I met most of the artists and producers that contributed to this album on MySpace back in 2005," DELS remembers. We had a page called “Loners", where myself and the likes of Kwes, Micachu, Ghostpoet, Sampha, Coby Sey, Elan Tamara were all featured – way before anybody knew who we were. We always said that we'd do a proper album together eventually. Petals Have Fallen is probably the closest thing to that collaborative album happening to date’

Petals Have Fallen is a classic album from this astonishing musician, and his talented crop of friends.

Kieren Gallear aka DELS is a new type of rapper (which is another way of saying that he’s more than just a rapper). Applying the kind of attention to detail, micro-management and macro-vision which Jay-Z used to build a business empire, DELS makes art. Popular art mind you, but art all the same, an album of emotional peaks, musical innovation and surreal, brilliant lyrics, held together by a strong, unique vision.

Gallear “never set out to be a rapper. It just happened. I was always obsessed with words. I was always cutting out random letterforms from newspapers or books because I liked the way that they sat on the page visually. This lead to me scribbling random thoughts into the back of school books and eventually picking up the mic to record those thoughts on a beat. I loved the freedom of how words can sit together in hip hop.”

An early break came when Suffolk resident John Peel heard DELS and his crew rapping at a local event and asked them to come on to his show on Radio 1. Ten years later and Gallear was back recording a session for the DJ’s spiritual heir at the station, Huw Stephens. But the intervening decade wasn’t wasted on selling weed, or unemployment, or running with a gang or any of the cliches of “urban” music. In his methodical, thoughtful way, Gallear put his efforts into his education. “Studying illustration, film, photography and Graphic Design. Attempting to forge a career within the arts, which then led to me combining it all with my music. ‘I’d been working on GOB since 2007, behind the scenes,” he says of his 2011 debut LP.

Gallear worked with three complementary but very different producers on his debut album. One of the people listening in on that Peel session was Joe Goddard, then of an unknown band called Hot Chip. He got in touch and the two began working together, cementing a friendship which finds its pinnacle in their collaborations on GOB. Micachu, on the other hand, is best known for her work with her band The Shapes, their classification as “indie” largely ignoring her classical training and long-term interest in grime. Kwes, recently signed to Warp Records in his own right, has worked with Damon Albarn, The XX, The Invisible and Speech Debelle. “They all provided me with challenging, but very inspiring music that enabled me to roam free creatively,” DELS explains. “Kwes, Joe Goddard and Micachu helped me shape a sound that is very difficult to box within one specific genre tag, which is exactly what I wanted with that album. I wanted the music to take on a life of it’s own. And not take itself too seriously!”

After the record's release, Gallear went on the road with a three piece band which completely re-wrote the rules of live hip hop, finding a sound which was as near to New Order as it was to the Roots. He has toured all over Europe, playing festivals and clubs and developing further his reputation for a kind of emotional openness which is pretty much unique in hip hop. Over the last few months, DELS has begun to work furiously on a new album. The Black Salad EP, which received repeat plays from Zane Lowe, Annie Mac and Huw Stephens at Radio 1, is a taster of what's to come. Lead track Bird Milk made its debut in an earlier form on the Kwesachu Volume 2 mixtape and DELS is keeping the same core of collaborators while reaching out to new producers for his second album.

That album is now complete. A stunning consolidation of everything that makes DELS great, as well as a giant leap forward sonically and imaginatively, Petals Have Fallen is an ultra-modern hip-hop masterpiece.

Kwes took a more hands-on, directorial role on this record, stepping forward to executive produce the album. Other collaborators represent the renaissance of fruitful, purposeful experimental music that’s come of age in London of late. Rosie Lowe, singer, songwriter and instrumentalist, recently signed to Paul Epworth’s Wolf Tone label, lends her shimmering vocal skill to the starkly beautiful Burning Beaches. Micachu, fresh from creating one of the most startling and effective soundtracks of recent years for Jonathan Glazer’s Under the Skin, re-appears to lend her inimitable, visceral sonic genius to standout RGB.

South London avant-songstress Kerry Leatham has one of the finest voices and most original approaches to her craft that the capital has produced in recent years - she lends her considerable talent to Pulls. Add electronic music powerhouse and Ninja Tune legend Bonobo into the mix, as well as Mizz Beats, Eli-T and Kwes’ brilliant younger brother Coby Sey, and Kwes had a potent arsenal of musicians at his executive producer’s fingertips.

The album was recorded and produced in Kwes’ shipping container studio in London’s docklands, over a period of 18 months. Most of the actual writing took place in DELS’ flat in Peckham. ‘I found it difficult to write during the day,’ DELS says. ‘The songs always seemed to come together late at night as I laid bed, writing down my thoughts on my phone.’ Though this may have been a tortuous method for the writer, it’s an approach that’s delivered in spades for the listener. Petals Have Fallen is imbued with a late-night, soul-baring intimacy that’s rare on any sort of album, let alone in hip-hop. Like all the best records, the album is a self-contained universe, a window into DELS world that draws you gratefully in.

The album is also highly visual, casually littered with striking images. ‘The most ritualistic thing I did whilst I wrote the songs was pinning up visuals around me for inspiration. I’d often have movies that have meant so much to me over the years, like Akira, Blade Runner, Alien and The Shining, on in the background with no sound,’ DELS says. ‘I also had a few of my own landscape portraits and illustrations pinned up on the walls too.’

Petals Have Fallen is one of the first classic albums from a scene of musicians that has been years in the making, and marks a true resurgence of artistically worthwhile but viscerally thrilling music from London.

"I met most of the artists and producers that contributed to this album on MySpace back in 2005," DELS remembers. We had a page called “Loners", where myself and the likes of Kwes, Micachu, Ghostpoet, Sampha, Coby Sey, Elan Tamara were all featured – way before anybody knew who we were. We always said that we'd do a proper album together eventually. Petals Have Fallen is probably the closest thing to that collaborative album happening to date’

Petals Have Fallen is a classic album from this astonishing musician, and his talented crop of friends.

The young electronic musician known as Romare wears his inspiration on his sleeve – in fact, he takes his very name from it. Having studied African American Visual Culture at University, he had his ‘Sex Pistols moment’ when he came across the work of Romare Bearden. The African American’s collaged, cut’n’paste artworks inspired the young musician to apply a similar technique to music – an approach that was hugely fruitful, and remains central to his work today. After stints as a drummer and guitarist throughout school and university, he moved to Paris where he picked up the turntables and began mixing his own music with samples from second hand records. Romare the musician was born and the template for his debut record.

Underground hothouse Black Acre signed him in 2012, adding him to a formidable roster that included Loops Haunt, Fantastic Mr Fox, Blue Daisy and Dark Sky. The imprint put out his first release Meditations on Afrocentrism in March of that year. He began to play shows, making enough money to finance a move to London. Ensconced in the vast musical melting pot of the capital, he began work on his second EP Love Songs: Part One. Romare’s songs were included on compilations by heavyweights such as Bonobo and Tiga, as well as the Brownswood Recordings imprint.

His debut album, Projections, is named after a pivotal exhibition of his namesake and likewise explores various elements of American life. The album is in many ways a homage to the cycle of cultural appropriation in America. “Work Song” is a tribute to the classic American and namesake work song, whilst “Rainbow” is a celebration of disco. Projections expertly catalogues the movements of influence within music. The album doesn’t just sample music and vocal snatches, but also other sources such as documentaries and marries live instrumentation with the sampling palette.

With fierce support from by the likes of Benji B, Gilles Peterson and Huw Stephens, Romare’s music has, rightfully, already caused a stir. The stage is now set for his stunning debut album, Projections.

The young electronic musician known as Romare wears his inspiration on his sleeve – in fact, he takes his very name from it. Having studied African American Visual Culture at University, he had his ‘Sex Pistols moment’ when he came across the work of Romare Bearden. The African American’s collaged, cut’n’paste artworks inspired the young musician to apply a similar technique to music – an approach that was hugely fruitful, and remains central to his work today. After stints as a drummer and guitarist throughout school and university, he moved to Paris where he picked up the turntables and began mixing his own music with samples from second hand records. Romare the musician was born and the template for his debut record.

Underground hothouse Black Acre signed him in 2012, adding him to a formidable roster that included Loops Haunt, Fantastic Mr Fox, Blue Daisy and Dark Sky. The imprint put out his first release Meditations on Afrocentrism in March of that year. He began to play shows, making enough money to finance a move to London. Ensconced in the vast musical melting pot of the capital, he began work on his second EP Love Songs: Part One. Romare’s songs were included on compilations by heavyweights such as Bonobo and Tiga, as well as the Brownswood Recordings imprint.

His debut album, Projections, is named after a pivotal exhibition of his namesake and likewise explores various elements of American life. The album is in many ways a homage to the cycle of cultural appropriation in America. “Work Song” is a tribute to the classic American and namesake work song, whilst “Rainbow” is a celebration of disco. Projections expertly catalogues the movements of influence within music. The album doesn’t just sample music and vocal snatches, but also other sources such as documentaries and marries live instrumentation with the sampling palette.

With fierce support from by the likes of Benji B, Gilles Peterson and Huw Stephens, Romare’s music has, rightfully, already caused a stir. The stage is now set for his stunning debut album, Projections.

Young Fathers were christened in 2008, named after the fact that all three members were named for their fathers..

They are:

‘G’ Hastings, from Drylaw, Edinburgh, Alloysious Massaquoi, originally from Liberia via Ghana and Kayus Bankole, born in Edinburgh to Nigerian parents but partially raised in Maryland in the USA, all 27 years old. Their live shows are complimented by Steven Morrison (drums & DJ) and Lauren Holt (AKA LAWholt - vocals).

The group formed after meeting at an under-16s hiphop night at the infamous Bongo Club in Edinburgh when they were all 14 years old. Almost immediately they started writing and recording together, initially on an old karoake machine plugged into a cheap cassette recorderat G’s parents house.

After going through various guises over several years and after hooking up with a local production company, they eventually settled on the name Young Fathers and recorded their first album with Tim Brinkhurst (AKA London) as producer. The recordings included their first single, Straight Back On It, which was given a limited release in 2009 and was received well enough to get them a couple of TV appearances, plays on BBC radio, some festival dates and the support slots with Simian Mobile Disco and Esser on UK tours.

Straight Back On It, a bang-on-the-money pop song built around Afrika Bambaataa’s reworking of Kraftwerk, was indicative of the rest of the album, Inconceivable Child… Conceived, in as much as the album was a state of the art teenage pop collection. Unfortunately the album was never released; however, another single, separately recorded, Automatic, was given a limited online release, but failed to have much impact.

In 2011 and after writing and recording yet another, unreleased album, the group decided a radical change was necessary and they finally disconnected themselves from the local production company and took control of their destiny. Recording mini-album (or ‘mixtape’ as it was called) TAPE ONE in just over a week, finishing a track a day and having it available for download within two weeks of recording gave them renewed vigour. They quickly followed this up by recording TAPE TWO in a similar fashion. Los Angeles based alt-hiphop label, Anticon, discovered them online and within a few months had signed them up for a short deal that saw both TAPEs officially released in 2013.

The group, meanwhile, continued to tour, gathering an impressive reputation as a fierce live act. They played all over Europe and made their US debut at SxSW in Austin, Texas, in March 2013.

Following support from the BBC’s Zane Lowe and Lauren Laverne, and an appearance on influential USA talk show, Jimmy Kimmel in 2014, TAPE TWO won Scottish Album Of The Year (‘The SAY Award’) and this was followed by their latest album, DEAD, released this time on Anticon in the USA and Big Dada in the UK and Europe, receiving the Mercury Award for best album of 2014. They won as the underdogs and there was a minor controversy because they didn’t look particularly joyful at the presentation and because they refused to speak to some of the more right wing press covering the event.

Immediately after winning the Mercury, YFs travelled to Berlin where they continued making their new album in a freezing basement in a building near the railway yards. Returning to the more familiar (and warmer) basement studio in Edinburgh where most of their recordings were made, to finish the album, they ended 2014 by playing a home town show at Edinburgh’s Hogmanay New year’s Eve festival in front of several thousand people.

The new album, White Men Are Black Men Too, has been recorded at various places around the world, including Melbourne and London as well as Berlin and Edinburgh and features the Leith Congregational Choir on a couple of tracks.

Young Fathers played over 140 shows during 2014, including On Blackheath Festival (curated by Massive Attack). They toured the UK, large swathes of Europe and did a six week stint in the USA. The new year already has them booked to play even more. White Men Are Black Men Too is due for release in April.

Young Fathers were christened in 2008, named after the fact that all three members were named for their fathers..

They are:

‘G’ Hastings, from Drylaw, Edinburgh, Alloysious Massaquoi, originally from Liberia via Ghana and Kayus Bankole, born in Edinburgh to Nigerian parents but partially raised in Maryland in the USA, all 27 years old. Their live shows are complimented by Steven Morrison (drums & DJ) and Lauren Holt (AKA LAWholt - vocals).

The group formed after meeting at an under-16s hiphop night at the infamous Bongo Club in Edinburgh when they were all 14 years old. Almost immediately they started writing and recording together, initially on an old karoake machine plugged into a cheap cassette recorderat G’s parents house.

After going through various guises over several years and after hooking up with a local production company, they eventually settled on the name Young Fathers and recorded their first album with Tim Brinkhurst (AKA London) as producer. The recordings included their first single, Straight Back On It, which was given a limited release in 2009 and was received well enough to get them a couple of TV appearances, plays on BBC radio, some festival dates and the support slots with Simian Mobile Disco and Esser on UK tours.

Straight Back On It, a bang-on-the-money pop song built around Afrika Bambaataa’s reworking of Kraftwerk, was indicative of the rest of the album, Inconceivable Child… Conceived, in as much as the album was a state of the art teenage pop collection. Unfortunately the album was never released; however, another single, separately recorded, Automatic, was given a limited online release, but failed to have much impact.

In 2011 and after writing and recording yet another, unreleased album, the group decided a radical change was necessary and they finally disconnected themselves from the local production company and took control of their destiny. Recording mini-album (or ‘mixtape’ as it was called) TAPE ONE in just over a week, finishing a track a day and having it available for download within two weeks of recording gave them renewed vigour. They quickly followed this up by recording TAPE TWO in a similar fashion. Los Angeles based alt-hiphop label, Anticon, discovered them online and within a few months had signed them up for a short deal that saw both TAPEs officially released in 2013.

The group, meanwhile, continued to tour, gathering an impressive reputation as a fierce live act. They played all over Europe and made their US debut at SxSW in Austin, Texas, in March 2013.

Following support from the BBC’s Zane Lowe and Lauren Laverne, and an appearance on influential USA talk show, Jimmy Kimmel in 2014, TAPE TWO won Scottish Album Of The Year (‘The SAY Award’) and this was followed by their latest album, DEAD, released this time on Anticon in the USA and Big Dada in the UK and Europe, receiving the Mercury Award for best album of 2014. They won as the underdogs and there was a minor controversy because they didn’t look particularly joyful at the presentation and because they refused to speak to some of the more right wing press covering the event.

Immediately after winning the Mercury, YFs travelled to Berlin where they continued making their new album in a freezing basement in a building near the railway yards. Returning to the more familiar (and warmer) basement studio in Edinburgh where most of their recordings were made, to finish the album, they ended 2014 by playing a home town show at Edinburgh’s Hogmanay New year’s Eve festival in front of several thousand people.

The new album, White Men Are Black Men Too, has been recorded at various places around the world, including Melbourne and London as well as Berlin and Edinburgh and features the Leith Congregational Choir on a couple of tracks.

Young Fathers played over 140 shows during 2014, including On Blackheath Festival (curated by Massive Attack). They toured the UK, large swathes of Europe and did a six week stint in the USA. The new year already has them booked to play even more. White Men Are Black Men Too is due for release in April.

Fin Greenall, who is the voice and heart behind Fink, often gets mistaken for other people.

At the BMI Awards in the US, a ‘roomful of gangstas and playas’ were
convinced the Cornwall-born, Bristol-raised Englishman was a lawyer, and
not a songwriter picking up an ‘American Urban’ gong – one of three
BMIs he received for his work with John Legend on the soul singer’s
Evolver album.

In Berlin, clubbing capital of the world, they think he helps run a
small minimal techno label. In certain London circles he’s known as the
hardworking insider whose past roles at DefJam, Sony Music, Talkin’
Loud, and Source saw him work with a range of artists longer than the
horizon. At the BBC, they imagine Fink as perhaps the only musician who
has played both the Electric Proms and the actual Proms (was that really
the same guy leading a 120-piece orchestra at the Royal Albert Hall in
an ‘immense’ cover of Roy Ayers’ Everybody Loves The Sunshine?).

In record company circles, he’s the producer who worked on the first
demos by Amy Winehouse and the writer who’s been crafting hooks for
Professor Green. In big-room booths around the world, he’s the
internationally-renowned DJ and Ninja Tune stalwart who finally hung up
his Sennheisers with a valedictory set at London’s Fabric in 2003. ‘My
skillset just seemed so old compared to these guys that could DJ for six
hours without one high-hat out of place using Ableton or something,’ he
notes admiringly.

Who is Fin Greenall? All of the above.

Yes, the now-Brighton-based musician acknowledges, he has done – does do
– all of those things. ‘But none of that is as important as how I feel
when I write songs like "Fear is Like Fire" and "Perfect Darkness". The Fink
thing is my main thing.’

As a kid, the one thing of his dad’s that Fin Greenall wasn’t allowed to
touch was the old Martin acoustic guitar. ‘It was his one possession
where he said, “everything in this house is owned by everybody – apart
from that.”’ But with age – and the burgeoning of his son’s skills as a
player – came a relaxation of the exclusion zone: Greenall plays the
Martin on the punchy, Jeff Buckley-covering-Radiohead-esque "Fear Is Like
Fire". It’s sure to become a live stand-out on Fink’s upcoming,
18-month-long world tour. ‘It’s all about trying to look at fear and be
optimistic – you can be really negative or fucking embrace it and use
it.

‘The great thing about growing up in a house where music is a big
factor,’ he continues, ‘was the fact that music being part of your life
was a perfectly natural thing.’

Music, it seems, became more than that: it was Greenall’s life. He
hoovered up the sounds he heard on John Peel: ‘The Cure, The Smiths, The
Orb, African music, Japanese hardcore’. He embraced skateboarding, the
music and the fashion – ‘it was an awesome way to grow your own
culture’. At university in Leeds, electronic and dance music became
everything.

‘It was definitely about wanting to be part of a revolution that I could
call my own,’ he recalls. ‘A couple of friends and I clubbed together
our student loans and bought equipment to make ambient techno – we were
really inspired by Aphex Twin and The Orb and Moby. We were amazed at
how fucking easy it was to make ambient techno. It wasn’t easy to make
good ambient techno,’ he laughs. ‘But it was easy enough to make techno
good enough to get us signed after six months of mucking around at uni.’

The young techno warrior was messianic.

‘I thought the song was dead, the chorus was dead, playing drums and
guitar and bass was so old-school and outdated and why would you want to
do that? Dylan did that 50 years ago! We should be part of this new
revolution, instrumentalism, acid house, rave culture, techno – this
stuff is a brave new avant-garde frontier and you should be involved.’

His ardour and his skills saw Greenall become part of the Ninja Tune
family – first signed on the back of a cassette-tape demo - as artist,
DJ, writer, producer, and remixer.

‘Brilliant times,’ he sighs nostalgically. ‘Sometimes you’d just have to
pinch yourself. Then, other times, you wake up in Bratislava on a
Tuesday morning and you’re reminded that there is hard work to all of
this.’ All that crate-digging wasn’t all it’s cracked up to be either:
‘You can’t be shit!’ Greenall grins. ‘And because of the community that
Ninja has worldwide, if you are shit everybody knows about it the next
day. Eight years of DJing have given me an obscenely huge record
collection. I just cleared out the breaks section – four crates of
twelves that were total pony!’

So the wheels of steel started to fall off.

‘It wasn’t until I’d run that right the way through to its natural
conclusion – I’m an international DJ on the biggest DJ label in the
world – that I thought: I’m kinda over it. And it was actually working
with a young artist straight out of school called Amy Winehouse that
inspired me to go, “wow, songs are great! Now I get how difficult it is,
and how much talent there is involved in this. It’s more of a challenge
than clubbing.”’

Greenall melted down his turntables and recast them as a guitar and a
stool. Metaphorically speaking. His parents were pleased. ‘My career
only made sense to them when I picked up a guitar and started to sing,’
he says. ‘All of a sudden I was doing music, I wasn’t just mucking
around. But in my rave days, DJing techno and breaks, they didn’t get
that at all. That’s probably why I did it in the first place.

‘But I realised: if your music had songs in it, it had a much greater
reach. Not in business terms, but if a singer of, say, Amy’s calibre
sings over this beat, it becomes so much bigger than just a beat. I
can’t get rid of my clubbing past, not that I’d want to. But the linear
nature of some of my music is definitely because of all those years
spent clubbing and DJing, when a very simple idea can make the best club
record. And it’s the same with songs – I’m after a really simple riff
or really simple lyric or melody. And it’s about keeping that beautiful
moment going for as long as you can.’

Fin Greenall, who is the voice and heart behind Fink, often gets mistaken for other people.

At the BMI Awards in the US, a ‘roomful of gangstas and playas’ were
convinced the Cornwall-born, Bristol-raised Englishman was a lawyer, and
not a songwriter picking up an ‘American Urban’ gong – one of three
BMIs he received for his work with John Legend on the soul singer’s
Evolver album.

In Berlin, clubbing capital of the world, they think he helps run a
small minimal techno label. In certain London circles he’s known as the
hardworking insider whose past roles at DefJam, Sony Music, Talkin’
Loud, and Source saw him work with a range of artists longer than the
horizon. At the BBC, they imagine Fink as perhaps the only musician who
has played both the Electric Proms and the actual Proms (was that really
the same guy leading a 120-piece orchestra at the Royal Albert Hall in
an ‘immense’ cover of Roy Ayers’ Everybody Loves The Sunshine?).

In record company circles, he’s the producer who worked on the first
demos by Amy Winehouse and the writer who’s been crafting hooks for
Professor Green. In big-room booths around the world, he’s the
internationally-renowned DJ and Ninja Tune stalwart who finally hung up
his Sennheisers with a valedictory set at London’s Fabric in 2003. ‘My
skillset just seemed so old compared to these guys that could DJ for six
hours without one high-hat out of place using Ableton or something,’ he
notes admiringly.

Who is Fin Greenall? All of the above.

Yes, the now-Brighton-based musician acknowledges, he has done – does do
– all of those things. ‘But none of that is as important as how I feel
when I write songs like "Fear is Like Fire" and "Perfect Darkness". The Fink
thing is my main thing.’

As a kid, the one thing of his dad’s that Fin Greenall wasn’t allowed to
touch was the old Martin acoustic guitar. ‘It was his one possession
where he said, “everything in this house is owned by everybody – apart
from that.”’ But with age – and the burgeoning of his son’s skills as a
player – came a relaxation of the exclusion zone: Greenall plays the
Martin on the punchy, Jeff Buckley-covering-Radiohead-esque "Fear Is Like
Fire". It’s sure to become a live stand-out on Fink’s upcoming,
18-month-long world tour. ‘It’s all about trying to look at fear and be
optimistic – you can be really negative or fucking embrace it and use
it.

‘The great thing about growing up in a house where music is a big
factor,’ he continues, ‘was the fact that music being part of your life
was a perfectly natural thing.’

Music, it seems, became more than that: it was Greenall’s life. He
hoovered up the sounds he heard on John Peel: ‘The Cure, The Smiths, The
Orb, African music, Japanese hardcore’. He embraced skateboarding, the
music and the fashion – ‘it was an awesome way to grow your own
culture’. At university in Leeds, electronic and dance music became
everything.

‘It was definitely about wanting to be part of a revolution that I could
call my own,’ he recalls. ‘A couple of friends and I clubbed together
our student loans and bought equipment to make ambient techno – we were
really inspired by Aphex Twin and The Orb and Moby. We were amazed at
how fucking easy it was to make ambient techno. It wasn’t easy to make
good ambient techno,’ he laughs. ‘But it was easy enough to make techno
good enough to get us signed after six months of mucking around at uni.’

The young techno warrior was messianic.

‘I thought the song was dead, the chorus was dead, playing drums and
guitar and bass was so old-school and outdated and why would you want to
do that? Dylan did that 50 years ago! We should be part of this new
revolution, instrumentalism, acid house, rave culture, techno – this
stuff is a brave new avant-garde frontier and you should be involved.’

His ardour and his skills saw Greenall become part of the Ninja Tune
family – first signed on the back of a cassette-tape demo - as artist,
DJ, writer, producer, and remixer.

‘Brilliant times,’ he sighs nostalgically. ‘Sometimes you’d just have to
pinch yourself. Then, other times, you wake up in Bratislava on a
Tuesday morning and you’re reminded that there is hard work to all of
this.’ All that crate-digging wasn’t all it’s cracked up to be either:
‘You can’t be shit!’ Greenall grins. ‘And because of the community that
Ninja has worldwide, if you are shit everybody knows about it the next
day. Eight years of DJing have given me an obscenely huge record
collection. I just cleared out the breaks section – four crates of
twelves that were total pony!’

So the wheels of steel started to fall off.

‘It wasn’t until I’d run that right the way through to its natural
conclusion – I’m an international DJ on the biggest DJ label in the
world – that I thought: I’m kinda over it. And it was actually working
with a young artist straight out of school called Amy Winehouse that
inspired me to go, “wow, songs are great! Now I get how difficult it is,
and how much talent there is involved in this. It’s more of a challenge
than clubbing.”’

Greenall melted down his turntables and recast them as a guitar and a
stool. Metaphorically speaking. His parents were pleased. ‘My career
only made sense to them when I picked up a guitar and started to sing,’
he says. ‘All of a sudden I was doing music, I wasn’t just mucking
around. But in my rave days, DJing techno and breaks, they didn’t get
that at all. That’s probably why I did it in the first place.

‘But I realised: if your music had songs in it, it had a much greater
reach. Not in business terms, but if a singer of, say, Amy’s calibre
sings over this beat, it becomes so much bigger than just a beat. I
can’t get rid of my clubbing past, not that I’d want to. But the linear
nature of some of my music is definitely because of all those years
spent clubbing and DJing, when a very simple idea can make the best club
record. And it’s the same with songs – I’m after a really simple riff
or really simple lyric or melody. And it’s about keeping that beautiful
moment going for as long as you can.’

Simon Green, AKA Bonobo, is an artist very much at the peak of his powers. His 2013 album ‘The North Borders’ was the high watermark of his career to date: a masterful record, marrying Green's inimitable melodic genius to cutting edge electronics, bass and drums.

An artist that constantly pushes himself outside of his musical comfort zone, Bonobo’s ranging personal tastes and regularly expanding range of synthesizers and instruments continue to take his productions to new levels. This outlook has earned him a reputation as one of the most pioneering figures in electronic music, in both his solo DJ sets and 12-piece live band shows.

All this comes as the result of over ten years hard work, and five albums that have honed Green's skills. A born musician, Green - like many artists - expresses himself most articulately via his music. The result is that his work is always keenly felt, and always feels imperative. There are no wasted moments, and myriad great ones.

It's tempting to relate Green's yearning, emotive aesthetic to his upbringing in rural Hampshire. His move to Brighton is also an influence; his skill at drum programming perhaps harking back to his days DJing and producing in the small, musically fertile town. Under the initial guidance of Tru Thoughts' Rob Luis and at nights such as Phonic:hoop, Bonobo found an early education in music.

His first album - 2000's 'Animal Magic' - was released via Tru Thoughts before being picked up by Ninja Tune. It announced him as a serious talent; able to bring a true musician's edge to electronic music, with all the freedom that skill allowed. His subsequent albums for Ninja, Dial M for Monkey and Days to Come, developed his sensibility, won him fans across the globe, and saw him develop his live show into a mesmeric re-working of his records.

He also worked hard as a DJ, a part of Green's arsenal that perhaps truly came into its own at the same time as 2010’s Black Sands. 2012 saw him take the uptempo, club re-edits of Black Sands from a seminal Boiler Room performance in London to dance floors across the world, and unveil a new light show that further enhanced the impact of these stunning songs. A remix album was released featuring reworkings by fans and peers such as Machinedrum, Floating Points, Mark Pitchard, Lapalux and Falty DL.

Later the same year, he finally settled down in his New York studio to write his fifth album. The North Borders was another long stride forward - both a natural evolution and a continuation of the electronic palette of Black Sands. Thematic, resonant, addictive and perfectly formed, it's a thrillingly coherent statement piece. With vocal features from no less than Erykah Badu, as well as Grey Reverend (Cinematic Orchestra) and Cornelia (Portico Quartet) it's another finely balanced body of work, leaving room for the beautiful, rich productions themselves to breathe and shine.

Bonobo has a long history of unearthing new talent (Andreya Triana, Bajka) and The North Borders saw him do so once again. The startling vocals of new collaborator Szjerdene are sprinkled across the album, and Green has yet again found the perfect voice to express where he's at.

Since the album’s release, Green has gone on to play over 175 shows across three continents and 30 countries, wowing audiences of almost 2 million people with the hypnotic, extended live versions of his songs. He performed sold out shows at The Sydney Opera House and Brixton Academy, and his very own, day long festival at London’s Roundhouse. 2014 saw him and his band play the iconic Coachella festival, Sonar, Glastonbury and many more. This period of extensive touring came to a breathtaking close with his largest show to date at London’s Alexandra Palace in November. In celebration, Ninja Tune released ‘The North Borders Tour. - Live’ in October. A deluxe release including a live album, hardback book and a DVD of seminal live performances from a truly memorable tour.

It’s a full schedule and then some, but one that’s constantly rewarding for his fans, and perhaps proves that Bonobo is not only one of the world’s hardest working artists in electronic music, but also one of its best.

Simon Green, AKA Bonobo, is an artist very much at the peak of his powers. His 2013 album ‘The North Borders’ was the high watermark of his career to date: a masterful record, marrying Green's inimitable melodic genius to cutting edge electronics, bass and drums.

An artist that constantly pushes himself outside of his musical comfort zone, Bonobo’s ranging personal tastes and regularly expanding range of synthesizers and instruments continue to take his productions to new levels. This outlook has earned him a reputation as one of the most pioneering figures in electronic music, in both his solo DJ sets and 12-piece live band shows.

All this comes as the result of over ten years hard work, and five albums that have honed Green's skills. A born musician, Green - like many artists - expresses himself most articulately via his music. The result is that his work is always keenly felt, and always feels imperative. There are no wasted moments, and myriad great ones.

It's tempting to relate Green's yearning, emotive aesthetic to his upbringing in rural Hampshire. His move to Brighton is also an influence; his skill at drum programming perhaps harking back to his days DJing and producing in the small, musically fertile town. Under the initial guidance of Tru Thoughts' Rob Luis and at nights such as Phonic:hoop, Bonobo found an early education in music.

His first album - 2000's 'Animal Magic' - was released via Tru Thoughts before being picked up by Ninja Tune. It announced him as a serious talent; able to bring a true musician's edge to electronic music, with all the freedom that skill allowed. His subsequent albums for Ninja, Dial M for Monkey and Days to Come, developed his sensibility, won him fans across the globe, and saw him develop his live show into a mesmeric re-working of his records.

He also worked hard as a DJ, a part of Green's arsenal that perhaps truly came into its own at the same time as 2010’s Black Sands. 2012 saw him take the uptempo, club re-edits of Black Sands from a seminal Boiler Room performance in London to dance floors across the world, and unveil a new light show that further enhanced the impact of these stunning songs. A remix album was released featuring reworkings by fans and peers such as Machinedrum, Floating Points, Mark Pitchard, Lapalux and Falty DL.

Later the same year, he finally settled down in his New York studio to write his fifth album. The North Borders was another long stride forward - both a natural evolution and a continuation of the electronic palette of Black Sands. Thematic, resonant, addictive and perfectly formed, it's a thrillingly coherent statement piece. With vocal features from no less than Erykah Badu, as well as Grey Reverend (Cinematic Orchestra) and Cornelia (Portico Quartet) it's another finely balanced body of work, leaving room for the beautiful, rich productions themselves to breathe and shine.

Bonobo has a long history of unearthing new talent (Andreya Triana, Bajka) and The North Borders saw him do so once again. The startling vocals of new collaborator Szjerdene are sprinkled across the album, and Green has yet again found the perfect voice to express where he's at.

Since the album’s release, Green has gone on to play over 175 shows across three continents and 30 countries, wowing audiences of almost 2 million people with the hypnotic, extended live versions of his songs. He performed sold out shows at The Sydney Opera House and Brixton Academy, and his very own, day long festival at London’s Roundhouse. 2014 saw him and his band play the iconic Coachella festival, Sonar, Glastonbury and many more. This period of extensive touring came to a breathtaking close with his largest show to date at London’s Alexandra Palace in November. In celebration, Ninja Tune released ‘The North Borders Tour. - Live’ in October. A deluxe release including a live album, hardback book and a DVD of seminal live performances from a truly memorable tour.

It’s a full schedule and then some, but one that’s constantly rewarding for his fans, and perhaps proves that Bonobo is not only one of the world’s hardest working artists in electronic music, but also one of its best.

Lee Bannon is an experimental hip-hop producer from Sacramento, California. His work has spread along the vast hip hop scene, having produced Joey Bada$$, Ab-Soul, Souls of Mischief and others. In addition, Bannon has evolved his sound into traces of trance, jungle, and deep house music and establishing himself as one of the few producers able to navigate across all soundscapes.

After a series of collaborations and releases he delivered the Fantastic Plastic album in 2012 and earlier that year premiered his Caligula Theme Music with Spin Magazine. Bannon toured with Joey Bada$$ in 2012 and appeared on Jimmy Fallon alongside The Roots performing Joey's hit single "Waves". He produced the B side to that single titled "Enter The Void" with Ab-Soul. In addition to the Bada$$/ Lil B diss track "Don't Quit Your Day Job", he also produced a few songs on the Pro era compilation Peep the The aPROcalypse and had a heavy presence on Joey's follow up project Summer Knights.

In February 2013, he released a free 10-track project and follow-up to his Caligula Theme Music EP titled Caligula Theme Music 2.7.5 and a few months later, the calmer free EP Never/mind/the/darkness/of/it...Later that summer, the hard core jungle-influenced track "NW/WB" took the internet by storm and listed him on Spin Magazine's top 5 artist to watch that month. Freshly signed to UK label Ninjatune, Bannon is ready to share his official debut album at the end of 2013.

Lee Bannon is an experimental hip-hop producer from Sacramento, California. His work has spread along the vast hip hop scene, having produced Joey Bada$$, Ab-Soul, Souls of Mischief and others. In addition, Bannon has evolved his sound into traces of trance, jungle, and deep house music and establishing himself as one of the few producers able to navigate across all soundscapes.

After a series of collaborations and releases he delivered the Fantastic Plastic album in 2012 and earlier that year premiered his Caligula Theme Music with Spin Magazine. Bannon toured with Joey Bada$$ in 2012 and appeared on Jimmy Fallon alongside The Roots performing Joey's hit single "Waves". He produced the B side to that single titled "Enter The Void" with Ab-Soul. In addition to the Bada$$/ Lil B diss track "Don't Quit Your Day Job", he also produced a few songs on the Pro era compilation Peep the The aPROcalypse and had a heavy presence on Joey's follow up project Summer Knights.

In February 2013, he released a free 10-track project and follow-up to his Caligula Theme Music EP titled Caligula Theme Music 2.7.5 and a few months later, the calmer free EP Never/mind/the/darkness/of/it...Later that summer, the hard core jungle-influenced track "NW/WB" took the internet by storm and listed him on Spin Magazine's top 5 artist to watch that month. Freshly signed to UK label Ninjatune, Bannon is ready to share his official debut album at the end of 2013.

The Bug first came to be in 1997, when Kevin collaborated with DJ Vadim on Tapping The Conversation. Released on N.Y’s Word Sound label, it was conceived as an alternate soundtrack to Coppola’s 'The Conversation’. No thought was given at the time that a collaboration with DJ Vadim would be a precursor to working with Ninja Tune 10 years later.

From 2001-2004 The Bug teamed up with UK dub veteran The Rootsman for a series of singles under the name Razor X Productions. The early productions of which would frame the template for the first proper Bug full length, 2003’s Pressure. The Razor X material was some of Kevin’s first foray’s into what would become a signature head-sheering apocalyptic dancehall production style. This was continued on Pressure but also with an ear to balancing out the sound with headier dubs. Classic dancehall M.C Daddy Freddy was brought in, New Flesh’s Toastie Taylor, along with The Rootsman, Roger Robinson, Paul St. Hilaire (aka. Tikiman), Wayne Lonesome, and more…

Towards the end of this period some crucial connections would come about that would shape The Bug’s work in the later half of this decade, one of which was being interviewed for XLR8R Magazine by Steve Goodman, aka. Kode 9. Finding they had a lot of similar music taste and interests Steve recommended a new crop of producers in London that he was hanging out with that were revolving around the Fwd Club at Plastic People. Discovering that these people shared the same hunger for bass, space, and unaligned sonic trajectories, The Bug felt right at home alongside Loefah, Digital Mystikz, Skream, etc… Over time this group of people would shape what would be commonly known as Dub-Step. Through his work with Wayne Lonesome, Kevin was turned on to the work of Warrior Queen. Instantly blown away by her delivery he made contact and the ensuing releases Aktion Pak (Rephlex) and Money Honey (under the moniker Pressure which was released on Kode 9’s Hyperdub label) further shaped the musical direction of The Bug. The final piece of the new incarnation of The Bug came about when Kevin was booked for a Mary Anne Hobbs session of BBC Radio 1’s Breezeblock. Two of the main vocalists requested were Roll Deep’s Flowdan, and Ricky Ranking (best known for his work as vocal foil/inspiration to Roots Manuva).

"It's angry and ferocious, but always triumphant: When it threatens to bust out your windows and rip holes in your speakers, it crackles with the kind of force that makes you want to punch the air as hard as your subwoofers do" (Pitchfork : London Zoo 8.6)

All these connections became the starting point for London Zoo, his critically acclaimed debut release for Ninja Tune which dropped in 2008. Utilizing the aforementioned vocalists, along with UK reggae legend Tippa Irie, it was a record grown out of the heart of London sound-system culture and multi-cultural meltdown. A record that although was referenced to the early dub-step scene, also busted outside of any of those narrow definitions and stood on its own as a celebration of the capital’s urban cultural clash, uniquely detonating dancehall, grime, hip-hop, and noise onslaughts. A record campaign that culminated in a personal invite from Trent Reznor to blow up stages in some of the most unlikely reaches of America on the Nine Inch NailsLights In The Sky tour.

Post London Zoo, The Bug alternated between live shows, and concentrating on this apocalyptic lovers rock project King Midas Sound. 2012 saw a re-emergence 7" style with his Acid Ragga imprint series. With a Roland TB-303 in hand he found the missing link between classic acid techno and digital dancehall. It was no second coming of acid/summer of love celebration. It was raw digi-grinds with the likes of Daddy Freddy, Warrior Queen, Copeland, and Miss Red up on them.

2013's Filthy EP marked the first rumblings of a new full length record. And now Angels & Devils is upon us (are amongst us). For this album Kevin Martin has both enlisted the familiar and smashed open the idea of what The Bug is. Grouping the results in two different distinct themes of Angels & Devils under the same conceptual banner. Both a year zero of sorts for The Bug, yet drawing on what has been before. Indeed The Bug is the only producer who can bring in the likes of Grouper, Copeland, Miss Red, Gonjasufi, Flowdan, Justin Broadrick (Godflesh/Jesu), Mala, Death Grips, and Warrior Queen and make it seamless. End times need a soundtrack to prep for what's above and below, and this is it.

The Bug first came to be in 1997, when Kevin collaborated with DJ Vadim on Tapping The Conversation. Released on N.Y’s Word Sound label, it was conceived as an alternate soundtrack to Coppola’s 'The Conversation’. No thought was given at the time that a collaboration with DJ Vadim would be a precursor to working with Ninja Tune 10 years later.

From 2001-2004 The Bug teamed up with UK dub veteran The Rootsman for a series of singles under the name Razor X Productions. The early productions of which would frame the template for the first proper Bug full length, 2003’s Pressure. The Razor X material was some of Kevin’s first foray’s into what would become a signature head-sheering apocalyptic dancehall production style. This was continued on Pressure but also with an ear to balancing out the sound with headier dubs. Classic dancehall M.C Daddy Freddy was brought in, New Flesh’s Toastie Taylor, along with The Rootsman, Roger Robinson, Paul St. Hilaire (aka. Tikiman), Wayne Lonesome, and more…

Towards the end of this period some crucial connections would come about that would shape The Bug’s work in the later half of this decade, one of which was being interviewed for XLR8R Magazine by Steve Goodman, aka. Kode 9. Finding they had a lot of similar music taste and interests Steve recommended a new crop of producers in London that he was hanging out with that were revolving around the Fwd Club at Plastic People. Discovering that these people shared the same hunger for bass, space, and unaligned sonic trajectories, The Bug felt right at home alongside Loefah, Digital Mystikz, Skream, etc… Over time this group of people would shape what would be commonly known as Dub-Step. Through his work with Wayne Lonesome, Kevin was turned on to the work of Warrior Queen. Instantly blown away by her delivery he made contact and the ensuing releases Aktion Pak (Rephlex) and Money Honey (under the moniker Pressure which was released on Kode 9’s Hyperdub label) further shaped the musical direction of The Bug. The final piece of the new incarnation of The Bug came about when Kevin was booked for a Mary Anne Hobbs session of BBC Radio 1’s Breezeblock. Two of the main vocalists requested were Roll Deep’s Flowdan, and Ricky Ranking (best known for his work as vocal foil/inspiration to Roots Manuva).

"It's angry and ferocious, but always triumphant: When it threatens to bust out your windows and rip holes in your speakers, it crackles with the kind of force that makes you want to punch the air as hard as your subwoofers do" (Pitchfork : London Zoo 8.6)

All these connections became the starting point for London Zoo, his critically acclaimed debut release for Ninja Tune which dropped in 2008. Utilizing the aforementioned vocalists, along with UK reggae legend Tippa Irie, it was a record grown out of the heart of London sound-system culture and multi-cultural meltdown. A record that although was referenced to the early dub-step scene, also busted outside of any of those narrow definitions and stood on its own as a celebration of the capital’s urban cultural clash, uniquely detonating dancehall, grime, hip-hop, and noise onslaughts. A record campaign that culminated in a personal invite from Trent Reznor to blow up stages in some of the most unlikely reaches of America on the Nine Inch NailsLights In The Sky tour.

Post London Zoo, The Bug alternated between live shows, and concentrating on this apocalyptic lovers rock project King Midas Sound. 2012 saw a re-emergence 7" style with his Acid Ragga imprint series. With a Roland TB-303 in hand he found the missing link between classic acid techno and digital dancehall. It was no second coming of acid/summer of love celebration. It was raw digi-grinds with the likes of Daddy Freddy, Warrior Queen, Copeland, and Miss Red up on them.

2013's Filthy EP marked the first rumblings of a new full length record. And now Angels & Devils is upon us (are amongst us). For this album Kevin Martin has both enlisted the familiar and smashed open the idea of what The Bug is. Grouping the results in two different distinct themes of Angels & Devils under the same conceptual banner. Both a year zero of sorts for The Bug, yet drawing on what has been before. Indeed The Bug is the only producer who can bring in the likes of Grouper, Copeland, Miss Red, Gonjasufi, Flowdan, Justin Broadrick (Godflesh/Jesu), Mala, Death Grips, and Warrior Queen and make it seamless. End times need a soundtrack to prep for what's above and below, and this is it.

There is a certain element of playfulness and wonder that can be heard in the music of the Viennese-born, self-taught multi-instrumentalist and producer Oliver Thomas Johnson, aka Dorian Concept.

After being exposed to hip hop in his early teens, he started to experiment with music production software on his parents’ computer at the age of 15. Around the same time, he picked up the piano, electric bass, and soprano saxophone, and since then he has been fascinated by combining the world of music production with the one of instrumental improvisation.

Dorian Concept started his career as a typical “bedroom producer” with a MySpace page in his late teens and enrolled in the University of Applied Sciences in Salzburg to study multi-media art in 2005. Just five years later, he was performing at the Royal Albert Hall with the Cinematic Orchestra, a group he had always admired, at the twentieth anniversary gala of Ninja Tune.

Some of the important stations of Dorian Concept’s rise from a bedroom producer studying in Salzburg to a Royal Albert Hall performer date back to 2006, when he started uploading a series of short videos of himself improvising on synthesizers on Youtube ­ starting with "Fooling Around on MicroKorg” ­ that have garnered over a million hits. Within a year, BBC radio greats like Benji B, Giles Peterson, and Mary Anne Hobbs championed his early digital releases, and shortly thereafter he started touring internationally.

In 2008, he participated in the Red Bull Musical Academy and released his first EP Maximized Minimalization on the Viennese label Affine Records. This EP ­ along with the subsequent track “The Fucking Formula” ­ was his take on instrumental hip hop at the time. His single “Trilingual Dance Sexperience” became a beast of its own right, acknowledged as a landmark for that unique Dorian Concept sound. Boomkat described it as “what sounds like the culmination of the last 10 years of techno, grime, hiphop club music and cutting-edge electronics attempting to race each other to the finishing line of the decade.”

In 2009, Kindred Spirits/Nod Navigators released his debut album When Planets Explode, which enjoyed critical and underground acclaim. The next two years were a blur of different cities and stages that brought his live show to Australia, Asia, all over Europe, and the States, while playing keys as part of Flying Lotus’ live band in between. His improvisational skills and virtuosity on his trusty MicroKorg shine during his animated live performances.

Dorian Concept’s jazz-influenced beat concoctions reap havoc on the dance-floor but never lose their sense of musicality. Unconventional chord changes, expressive dynamics and quirky layers of counterpoint melodies are parts of his unmistakable musical voice. He dots effortlessly through different genres and styles: from sublime electronica to hyperactive garage to avant-garde dancehall. Therefore, it made perfect sense when the multifaceted imprint Ninja Tune invited Dorian Concept to contribute to its twentieth anniversary box set in 2010 with the standout track "Her Tears Taste Like Pears.” It was no surprise that Ninja Tune then added him to its roster, releasing an EP under the same title in 2011.

Shortly after the Ninja Tune EP, Dorian Concept decided to take some time off to craft a new sound. He abandoned his signature use of the Mikrokorg and started working with a Wurlitzer electronic piano and a handful of analogue synthesizers. Joined Ends - his forthcoming album on Ninja Tune - showcases a new sound that reveals a radically different side of his artistic repertoire. A departure from rigid beat-making, he has chosen to concentrate on his intuition and his keyboard skills. Dorian Concept is also expanding his much lauded live show into a trio with touring planned for Autumn 2014 and beyond.

Joined Ends is his most deliberate, focused, and liberating work to date.

There is a certain element of playfulness and wonder that can be heard in the music of the Viennese-born, self-taught multi-instrumentalist and producer Oliver Thomas Johnson, aka Dorian Concept.

After being exposed to hip hop in his early teens, he started to experiment with music production software on his parents’ computer at the age of 15. Around the same time, he picked up the piano, electric bass, and soprano saxophone, and since then he has been fascinated by combining the world of music production with the one of instrumental improvisation.

Dorian Concept started his career as a typical “bedroom producer” with a MySpace page in his late teens and enrolled in the University of Applied Sciences in Salzburg to study multi-media art in 2005. Just five years later, he was performing at the Royal Albert Hall with the Cinematic Orchestra, a group he had always admired, at the twentieth anniversary gala of Ninja Tune.

Some of the important stations of Dorian Concept’s rise from a bedroom producer studying in Salzburg to a Royal Albert Hall performer date back to 2006, when he started uploading a series of short videos of himself improvising on synthesizers on Youtube ­ starting with "Fooling Around on MicroKorg” ­ that have garnered over a million hits. Within a year, BBC radio greats like Benji B, Giles Peterson, and Mary Anne Hobbs championed his early digital releases, and shortly thereafter he started touring internationally.

In 2008, he participated in the Red Bull Musical Academy and released his first EP Maximized Minimalization on the Viennese label Affine Records. This EP ­ along with the subsequent track “The Fucking Formula” ­ was his take on instrumental hip hop at the time. His single “Trilingual Dance Sexperience” became a beast of its own right, acknowledged as a landmark for that unique Dorian Concept sound. Boomkat described it as “what sounds like the culmination of the last 10 years of techno, grime, hiphop club music and cutting-edge electronics attempting to race each other to the finishing line of the decade.”

In 2009, Kindred Spirits/Nod Navigators released his debut album When Planets Explode, which enjoyed critical and underground acclaim. The next two years were a blur of different cities and stages that brought his live show to Australia, Asia, all over Europe, and the States, while playing keys as part of Flying Lotus’ live band in between. His improvisational skills and virtuosity on his trusty MicroKorg shine during his animated live performances.

Dorian Concept’s jazz-influenced beat concoctions reap havoc on the dance-floor but never lose their sense of musicality. Unconventional chord changes, expressive dynamics and quirky layers of counterpoint melodies are parts of his unmistakable musical voice. He dots effortlessly through different genres and styles: from sublime electronica to hyperactive garage to avant-garde dancehall. Therefore, it made perfect sense when the multifaceted imprint Ninja Tune invited Dorian Concept to contribute to its twentieth anniversary box set in 2010 with the standout track "Her Tears Taste Like Pears.” It was no surprise that Ninja Tune then added him to its roster, releasing an EP under the same title in 2011.

Shortly after the Ninja Tune EP, Dorian Concept decided to take some time off to craft a new sound. He abandoned his signature use of the Mikrokorg and started working with a Wurlitzer electronic piano and a handful of analogue synthesizers. Joined Ends - his forthcoming album on Ninja Tune - showcases a new sound that reveals a radically different side of his artistic repertoire. A departure from rigid beat-making, he has chosen to concentrate on his intuition and his keyboard skills. Dorian Concept is also expanding his much lauded live show into a trio with touring planned for Autumn 2014 and beyond.

Joined Ends is his most deliberate, focused, and liberating work to date.

If the name PORTICO seems familiar, that’s probably understandable, as is the fact that the faces behind it may seem recognisable too. As Portico Quartet, Jack Wyllie, Duncan Bellamy, Milo Fitzpatrick and then member Nick Mulvey released their first album together – the Mercury Music Prize nominated Knee-Deep In The North Sea – back in 2007, but things around a group change, especially when you start out so young, and by the time Mulvey’s successor, Keir Vine, had also moved on, the three London based musicians realised that they were no longer satisfied by the music they were making. They had, as they put it, “gone as far as they could”. It was early 2013 - they’d all grown up, and were no longer a quartet either. This time, they decided, it was their turn to make the changes.

LIVING FIELDS is the debut album by PORTICO, and if the people – and the name they employ – seem familiar, rest assured that the music they make is not. Gone are the hang drum, the saxophone and the drum kit with which they first caught the world’s attention. What emerges instead is – put simply – startling. The people are the same, but the band’s been transformed. PORTICO and LIVING FIELDS are the proof, and one listen makes it clear that this is almost entirely new territory for Fitzpatrick, Wyllie and Bellamy. Sparse, immersive and spectral, it’s an album that is at once substantial and yet insubstantial, capable of absorbing one into an intricate sonic world whose fundamental components seem paradoxically intangible.

The temptation might be to define LIVING FIELDS as an “electronic” album. As Bellamy points out, however, plenty of its components come from an analogue world. “I don't think we feel that it's overtly 'electronic',” he elaborates, “in the way that, say, Aphex Twin or Autechre are defined by the association. For starters, there's piano, guitar and bass on the record – though we usually try and treat them in an interesting way – as well as field recordings. For example, in ‘Void’ there’s a recording of a very large, old ship being torn apart, which ties into the concepts of decay and disintegration which run through the album. But a lot of the sounds are electronic and come from synthesisers, samplers or drum machines. Even most of the more acoustic sounds are mediated by effects or computers somehow.”

As it happens, the process of change began some time ago, and arguably, Mulvey’s departure from the ranks in 2011 was connected to this gradual metamorphosis. As Bellamy admits, “We were getting interested in electronics, and finding more ways we could expand the band’s sound, and as we were getting more enthusiastic, Nick was beginning to feel like his role was literally getting drowned out, and was becoming more interested in his own music”.

By late 2012, the band had reached a crossroads. The three of them, plus Vine, had experimented with new approaches, as well as vocalists, on that year’s eponymous album, but afterwards they found themselves in musical disarray. As Fitzpatrick recalls, “We just had this massive existential crisis, where we were like, I don’t think we want to do this any more, do we? No one seemed to be very enthusiastic about that current state of the band.” Wyllie underlines this: “It was a good time to take a step back, to really examine what we were collectively willing to do, and what we were interested in.”

In trying to rediscover what it was that had first brought them together, the musicians learned one crucial lesson: if they could identify their initial chemistry, then they could salvage the very essence of their creative energy. “That's the point we decided to draw a line under the old Portico Quartet,” Bellamy says, “and just do something that was really different and new, and a challenge for us again. It worked, because we suddenly felt way more invigorated and passionate about making music together again.” ‘Portico Quartet’, they understood at last, was merely the name of a project on which they’d collaborated. ‘PORTICO’ would be another.

This realisation, and the freedom that it allowed them, enabled the trio to reinvent themselves. Conscious that they were simultaneously the same band, and yet a new one, they chose to drop the ‘Quartet’ from their name as a symbol of their new beginnings, but to keep ‘Portico’ as, in Fitzpatrick’s words, “an acknowledgement that we are the same three people, with a certain chemistry, looking for the same things.” What followed was, in a sense, a return to their roots: though tracks were still built up using loops and individual sections, they embarked on more structured material, just as they had on their debut. “One of the things we were interested in, especially in the early stuff, was song writing,” Wyllie explains, “but by the third album we’d started to explore textures.” As a rejuvenated unit, PORTICO now incorporate both these elements into their music, with the likes of the title track, "101", "Colour Fading" and "Bright Luck" all strikingly melodic but elaborately arranged. “In the past,” Bellamy points out, “we had always written all together, playing through the compositions and arrangements with all our instruments. Once we were finished we would go to a studio to record it all live, and then do overdubs. This time we just invested in some gear for our studio and started recording directly onto the computer. If someone had an idea, we would put it down straight away, and that could be the finished track. It was quite liberating because suddenly we had way more control of the recording process.”

What subsequently materialised is, as they themselves describe it, “music which moves forward towards distant places while offering rare intimacy, arriving somewhere between structured pop songs and a disintegrating ambience, a unique blend of the sublunary and the celestial.” They were inspired by leftfield artists like William Basinski and Tim Hecker – with whose music theirs shares what Wyllie describes as “this feeling of something breaking up and falling apart” – and a crucial moment in their development came when they were asked by the Royal Academy of Art to write music for an exhibition about space and architecture in early 2014. “That opened up a new sound world,” Fitzpatrick says. “ ‘Void’ is actually from that session, and ‘Dissolution’ too.”

Aware that they were ready to work with vocalists, they sought suitable candidates, and eventually alighted on three singers with whom they already had a connection, and whose distinctive voices matched what they had in mind. The first part of the puzzle was Alt-J’sJoe Newman: he’d grown up two doors down from Wyllie in Southampton, where Fitzpatrick was also raised, and they’d always been mutual fans of each other’s music. His initial contribution, "101", was the proof PORTICO needed that their musical gamble had paid off, and he soon delivered further tracks, "Brittle" and "Atacama". “He’s obviously a really talented songwriter,” Wyllie states. “He just kept coming out with these great melodies, really quickly too. It helps collaborating with people if you’ve got a personal connection.” It was the personal connection that seemed vital: Old friend, and former Portico house mate, Jamie Woon, also came on board for the epic "Memory Of Newness": They’d always wanted to work together in the past, but only now did the material suit the concept. Woon, in turn, had introduced the band to Jono McCleery, One of the band’s favourite singers, he had opened for Portico Quartet at the ICA a few years earlier and, as with Jamie and Joe, the collaboration flowed naturally. The songs on which they would go on to collaborate were so successful that McCleery was invited to join the band to help play the new material live, and the album takes its title from one of their collaborations, the darkly hypnotic Living Fields.

From the outset, PORTICO insisted that LIVING FIELDS maintain an overarching concept, rather than being, as Wyllie puts it, “a collection of songs with totally disparate, unrelated lyrics”. Each of the band’s members had been forced to confront various diverse private issues in the preceding period of time, and they wanted the record to remain personal to them, despite these outside collaborators. Their search for a method of articulating the relevant themes included work by Herman Hesse and Philip Larkin, but eventually they found the touchstone they were searching for in the shape of an award-winning Chilean documentary, Nostalgia For The Light.

The film crystallised many of the topics that they’d been addressing amongst themselves – the search for identity, the significance of memory, questions about life and death, the way that each answer we uncover can provoke further mysteries – and they asked McCleery, Woon and Newman to view it before they wrote their lyrics. “It wasn’t like we watched it and said, Let’s make an album about that,” Wyllie clarifies. “It was, Let’s find something that we can use to inspire some singers that connects to what we’re thinking.” It was the final detail in the making of an extraordinary, enigmatic but unified record, and, just as some of the sounds seem to veer in and out of focus, so words and phrases drift through a haze of reverb-drenched pianos, synth arpeggios, subterranean bass and ambient noise, all punctured by illuminated shards of programmed and live drums.

The results are unlike anything else that’s come before and, for all the band know, may even be unlike anything they do in the future. As Fitzpatrick concludes, “This is just one album. Who knows what the next one’s going to be like? We’re taking it one step at a time. What we’ve learned is that it’s really all about us three.”

Welcome, then, PORTICO and their LIVING FIELDS: a bold, adventurous step into the unknown that bravely inspires as many questions as answers. As Hermann Hesse wrote in Stages, a poem from The Glass Bead Game that became one of the band’s maxims:

“Serenely they let us move to distant places,
And let no sentiment of home detain us.
The Cosmic Spirit seeks not to restrain us
But lifts us stage by stage to wider spaces.”

If the name PORTICO seems familiar, that’s probably understandable, as is the fact that the faces behind it may seem recognisable too. As Portico Quartet, Jack Wyllie, Duncan Bellamy, Milo Fitzpatrick and then member Nick Mulvey released their first album together – the Mercury Music Prize nominated Knee-Deep In The North Sea – back in 2007, but things around a group change, especially when you start out so young, and by the time Mulvey’s successor, Keir Vine, had also moved on, the three London based musicians realised that they were no longer satisfied by the music they were making. They had, as they put it, “gone as far as they could”. It was early 2013 - they’d all grown up, and were no longer a quartet either. This time, they decided, it was their turn to make the changes.

LIVING FIELDS is the debut album by PORTICO, and if the people – and the name they employ – seem familiar, rest assured that the music they make is not. Gone are the hang drum, the saxophone and the drum kit with which they first caught the world’s attention. What emerges instead is – put simply – startling. The people are the same, but the band’s been transformed. PORTICO and LIVING FIELDS are the proof, and one listen makes it clear that this is almost entirely new territory for Fitzpatrick, Wyllie and Bellamy. Sparse, immersive and spectral, it’s an album that is at once substantial and yet insubstantial, capable of absorbing one into an intricate sonic world whose fundamental components seem paradoxically intangible.

The temptation might be to define LIVING FIELDS as an “electronic” album. As Bellamy points out, however, plenty of its components come from an analogue world. “I don't think we feel that it's overtly 'electronic',” he elaborates, “in the way that, say, Aphex Twin or Autechre are defined by the association. For starters, there's piano, guitar and bass on the record – though we usually try and treat them in an interesting way – as well as field recordings. For example, in ‘Void’ there’s a recording of a very large, old ship being torn apart, which ties into the concepts of decay and disintegration which run through the album. But a lot of the sounds are electronic and come from synthesisers, samplers or drum machines. Even most of the more acoustic sounds are mediated by effects or computers somehow.”

As it happens, the process of change began some time ago, and arguably, Mulvey’s departure from the ranks in 2011 was connected to this gradual metamorphosis. As Bellamy admits, “We were getting interested in electronics, and finding more ways we could expand the band’s sound, and as we were getting more enthusiastic, Nick was beginning to feel like his role was literally getting drowned out, and was becoming more interested in his own music”.

By late 2012, the band had reached a crossroads. The three of them, plus Vine, had experimented with new approaches, as well as vocalists, on that year’s eponymous album, but afterwards they found themselves in musical disarray. As Fitzpatrick recalls, “We just had this massive existential crisis, where we were like, I don’t think we want to do this any more, do we? No one seemed to be very enthusiastic about that current state of the band.” Wyllie underlines this: “It was a good time to take a step back, to really examine what we were collectively willing to do, and what we were interested in.”

In trying to rediscover what it was that had first brought them together, the musicians learned one crucial lesson: if they could identify their initial chemistry, then they could salvage the very essence of their creative energy. “That's the point we decided to draw a line under the old Portico Quartet,” Bellamy says, “and just do something that was really different and new, and a challenge for us again. It worked, because we suddenly felt way more invigorated and passionate about making music together again.” ‘Portico Quartet’, they understood at last, was merely the name of a project on which they’d collaborated. ‘PORTICO’ would be another.

This realisation, and the freedom that it allowed them, enabled the trio to reinvent themselves. Conscious that they were simultaneously the same band, and yet a new one, they chose to drop the ‘Quartet’ from their name as a symbol of their new beginnings, but to keep ‘Portico’ as, in Fitzpatrick’s words, “an acknowledgement that we are the same three people, with a certain chemistry, looking for the same things.” What followed was, in a sense, a return to their roots: though tracks were still built up using loops and individual sections, they embarked on more structured material, just as they had on their debut. “One of the things we were interested in, especially in the early stuff, was song writing,” Wyllie explains, “but by the third album we’d started to explore textures.” As a rejuvenated unit, PORTICO now incorporate both these elements into their music, with the likes of the title track, "101", "Colour Fading" and "Bright Luck" all strikingly melodic but elaborately arranged. “In the past,” Bellamy points out, “we had always written all together, playing through the compositions and arrangements with all our instruments. Once we were finished we would go to a studio to record it all live, and then do overdubs. This time we just invested in some gear for our studio and started recording directly onto the computer. If someone had an idea, we would put it down straight away, and that could be the finished track. It was quite liberating because suddenly we had way more control of the recording process.”

What subsequently materialised is, as they themselves describe it, “music which moves forward towards distant places while offering rare intimacy, arriving somewhere between structured pop songs and a disintegrating ambience, a unique blend of the sublunary and the celestial.” They were inspired by leftfield artists like William Basinski and Tim Hecker – with whose music theirs shares what Wyllie describes as “this feeling of something breaking up and falling apart” – and a crucial moment in their development came when they were asked by the Royal Academy of Art to write music for an exhibition about space and architecture in early 2014. “That opened up a new sound world,” Fitzpatrick says. “ ‘Void’ is actually from that session, and ‘Dissolution’ too.”

Aware that they were ready to work with vocalists, they sought suitable candidates, and eventually alighted on three singers with whom they already had a connection, and whose distinctive voices matched what they had in mind. The first part of the puzzle was Alt-J’sJoe Newman: he’d grown up two doors down from Wyllie in Southampton, where Fitzpatrick was also raised, and they’d always been mutual fans of each other’s music. His initial contribution, "101", was the proof PORTICO needed that their musical gamble had paid off, and he soon delivered further tracks, "Brittle" and "Atacama". “He’s obviously a really talented songwriter,” Wyllie states. “He just kept coming out with these great melodies, really quickly too. It helps collaborating with people if you’ve got a personal connection.” It was the personal connection that seemed vital: Old friend, and former Portico house mate, Jamie Woon, also came on board for the epic "Memory Of Newness": They’d always wanted to work together in the past, but only now did the material suit the concept. Woon, in turn, had introduced the band to Jono McCleery, One of the band’s favourite singers, he had opened for Portico Quartet at the ICA a few years earlier and, as with Jamie and Joe, the collaboration flowed naturally. The songs on which they would go on to collaborate were so successful that McCleery was invited to join the band to help play the new material live, and the album takes its title from one of their collaborations, the darkly hypnotic Living Fields.

From the outset, PORTICO insisted that LIVING FIELDS maintain an overarching concept, rather than being, as Wyllie puts it, “a collection of songs with totally disparate, unrelated lyrics”. Each of the band’s members had been forced to confront various diverse private issues in the preceding period of time, and they wanted the record to remain personal to them, despite these outside collaborators. Their search for a method of articulating the relevant themes included work by Herman Hesse and Philip Larkin, but eventually they found the touchstone they were searching for in the shape of an award-winning Chilean documentary, Nostalgia For The Light.

The film crystallised many of the topics that they’d been addressing amongst themselves – the search for identity, the significance of memory, questions about life and death, the way that each answer we uncover can provoke further mysteries – and they asked McCleery, Woon and Newman to view it before they wrote their lyrics. “It wasn’t like we watched it and said, Let’s make an album about that,” Wyllie clarifies. “It was, Let’s find something that we can use to inspire some singers that connects to what we’re thinking.” It was the final detail in the making of an extraordinary, enigmatic but unified record, and, just as some of the sounds seem to veer in and out of focus, so words and phrases drift through a haze of reverb-drenched pianos, synth arpeggios, subterranean bass and ambient noise, all punctured by illuminated shards of programmed and live drums.

The results are unlike anything else that’s come before and, for all the band know, may even be unlike anything they do in the future. As Fitzpatrick concludes, “This is just one album. Who knows what the next one’s going to be like? We’re taking it one step at a time. What we’ve learned is that it’s really all about us three.”

Welcome, then, PORTICO and their LIVING FIELDS: a bold, adventurous step into the unknown that bravely inspires as many questions as answers. As Hermann Hesse wrote in Stages, a poem from The Glass Bead Game that became one of the band’s maxims:

“Serenely they let us move to distant places,
And let no sentiment of home detain us.
The Cosmic Spirit seeks not to restrain us
But lifts us stage by stage to wider spaces.”

Helena Hauff returns to Werkdiscs/Ninja Tune with a 5-track EP Lex Tertia - her first for the imprint since 2013's Actio Reactio. Released 30th March 2015 on 12" and digital formats. In her won words: "Lex Tertia is a further exploration into the idea of grimy, sonically crushed, dysfunctional, insane stuff that kicks on where Actio Reactio left off."

Helena Hauff returns to Werkdiscs/Ninja Tune with a 5-track EP Lex Tertia - her first for the imprint since 2013's Actio Reactio. Released 30th March 2015 on 12" and digital formats. In her won words: "Lex Tertia is a further exploration into the idea of grimy, sonically crushed, dysfunctional, insane stuff that kicks on where Actio Reactio left off."

Heavy anticipation has been brewing for quite some time as Brooklyn based producer, composer, pianist, DJ and live musician Taylor McFerrin is set to release his first full length LP, Early Riser in June 2014 on Flying Lotus's Brainfeeder record label.

Taylor's musical style is equally influenced by the legends of 60's / 70's Soul, the kings of the Modern Beat Generation, Golden Era hip hop, free form jazz and electronic music. By playing all of the instruments on his productions, while also relying heavily on sampling and chopping up his live takes, he has found a sound that seamlessly bridges myriad musical worlds that draws the listener into a constantly shifting beautiful audio soundscape.

By sustaining major buzz in the Future Soul scene through his first EP, Broken Vibes (featuring the acclaimed single, "Place in My Heart"), Taylor has toured worldwide as a one man show and has played major festivals such as Lollapalooza, Glastonbury, The Big Chill, and Gilles Peterson's Worldwide Festival. In his home base of New York City, he has performed at such legendary venues as The Apollo, The Blue Note, Radio City Music Hall and The Lincoln Jazz Center opening up for artists such as Erykah Badu, The Roots, Nas, Talib Kweli and Robert Glasper.

In addition to producing and performing, Taylor has served as the Head Instructor of the pioneering Beat Rockers program over the past 4 years teaching beatboxing and musical self-expression to students who are blind and/or have multiple disabilities at the Lavelle School for the Blind in the Bronx.

Taylor's ability to create and evolve musically by drawing inspiration from all corners of his life translates into a sound that evokes feeling and an innovative live set that is equal parts wonderment and musical dexterity.

Heavy anticipation has been brewing for quite some time as Brooklyn based producer, composer, pianist, DJ and live musician Taylor McFerrin is set to release his first full length LP, Early Riser in June 2014 on Flying Lotus's Brainfeeder record label.

Taylor's musical style is equally influenced by the legends of 60's / 70's Soul, the kings of the Modern Beat Generation, Golden Era hip hop, free form jazz and electronic music. By playing all of the instruments on his productions, while also relying heavily on sampling and chopping up his live takes, he has found a sound that seamlessly bridges myriad musical worlds that draws the listener into a constantly shifting beautiful audio soundscape.

By sustaining major buzz in the Future Soul scene through his first EP, Broken Vibes (featuring the acclaimed single, "Place in My Heart"), Taylor has toured worldwide as a one man show and has played major festivals such as Lollapalooza, Glastonbury, The Big Chill, and Gilles Peterson's Worldwide Festival. In his home base of New York City, he has performed at such legendary venues as The Apollo, The Blue Note, Radio City Music Hall and The Lincoln Jazz Center opening up for artists such as Erykah Badu, The Roots, Nas, Talib Kweli and Robert Glasper.

In addition to producing and performing, Taylor has served as the Head Instructor of the pioneering Beat Rockers program over the past 4 years teaching beatboxing and musical self-expression to students who are blind and/or have multiple disabilities at the Lavelle School for the Blind in the Bronx.

Taylor's ability to create and evolve musically by drawing inspiration from all corners of his life translates into a sound that evokes feeling and an innovative live set that is equal parts wonderment and musical dexterity.

Kieren Gallear aka DELS is a new type of rapper (which is another way of saying that he’s more than just a rapper). Applying the kind of attention to detail, micro-management and macro-vision which Jay-Z used to build a business empire, DELS makes art. Popular art mind you, but art all the same, an album of emotional peaks, musical innovation and surreal, brilliant lyrics, held together by a strong, unique vision.

Gallear “never set out to be a rapper. It just happened. I was always obsessed with words. I was always cutting out random letterforms from newspapers or books because I liked the way that they sat on the page visually. This lead to me scribbling random thoughts into the back of school books and eventually picking up the mic to record those thoughts on a beat. I loved the freedom of how words can sit together in hip hop.”

An early break came when Suffolk resident John Peel heard DELS and his crew rapping at a local event and asked them to come on to his show on Radio 1. Ten years later and Gallear was back recording a session for the DJ’s spiritual heir at the station, Huw Stephens. But the intervening decade wasn’t wasted on selling weed, or unemployment, or running with a gang or any of the cliches of “urban” music. In his methodical, thoughtful way, Gallear put his efforts into his education. “Studying illustration, film, photography and Graphic Design. Attempting to forge a career within the arts, which then led to me combining it all with my music. ‘I’d been working on GOB since 2007, behind the scenes,” he says of his 2011 debut LP.

Gallear worked with three complementary but very different producers on his debut album. One of the people listening in on that Peel session was Joe Goddard, then of an unknown band called Hot Chip. He got in touch and the two began working together, cementing a friendship which finds its pinnacle in their collaborations on GOB. Micachu, on the other hand, is best known for her work with her band The Shapes, their classification as “indie” largely ignoring her classical training and long-term interest in grime. Kwes, recently signed to Warp Records in his own right, has worked with Damon Albarn, The XX, The Invisible and Speech Debelle. “They all provided me with challenging, but very inspiring music that enabled me to roam free creatively,” DELS explains. “Kwes, Joe Goddard and Micachu helped me shape a sound that is very difficult to box within one specific genre tag, which is exactly what I wanted with that album. I wanted the music to take on a life of it’s own. And not take itself too seriously!”

After the record's release, Gallear went on the road with a three piece band which completely re-wrote the rules of live hip hop, finding a sound which was as near to New Order as it was to the Roots. He has toured all over Europe, playing festivals and clubs and developing further his reputation for a kind of emotional openness which is pretty much unique in hip hop. Over the last few months, DELS has begun to work furiously on a new album. The Black Salad EP, which received repeat plays from Zane Lowe, Annie Mac and Huw Stephens at Radio 1, is a taster of what's to come. Lead track Bird Milk made its debut in an earlier form on the Kwesachu Volume 2 mixtape and DELS is keeping the same core of collaborators while reaching out to new producers for his second album.

That album is now complete. A stunning consolidation of everything that makes DELS great, as well as a giant leap forward sonically and imaginatively, Petals Have Fallen is an ultra-modern hip-hop masterpiece.

Kwes took a more hands-on, directorial role on this record, stepping forward to executive produce the album. Other collaborators represent the renaissance of fruitful, purposeful experimental music that’s come of age in London of late. Rosie Lowe, singer, songwriter and instrumentalist, recently signed to Paul Epworth’s Wolf Tone label, lends her shimmering vocal skill to the starkly beautiful Burning Beaches. Micachu, fresh from creating one of the most startling and effective soundtracks of recent years for Jonathan Glazer’s Under the Skin, re-appears to lend her inimitable, visceral sonic genius to standout RGB.

South London avant-songstress Kerry Leatham has one of the finest voices and most original approaches to her craft that the capital has produced in recent years - she lends her considerable talent to Pulls. Add electronic music powerhouse and Ninja Tune legend Bonobo into the mix, as well as Mizz Beats, Eli-T and Kwes’ brilliant younger brother Coby Sey, and Kwes had a potent arsenal of musicians at his executive producer’s fingertips.

The album was recorded and produced in Kwes’ shipping container studio in London’s docklands, over a period of 18 months. Most of the actual writing took place in DELS’ flat in Peckham. ‘I found it difficult to write during the day,’ DELS says. ‘The songs always seemed to come together late at night as I laid bed, writing down my thoughts on my phone.’ Though this may have been a tortuous method for the writer, it’s an approach that’s delivered in spades for the listener. Petals Have Fallen is imbued with a late-night, soul-baring intimacy that’s rare on any sort of album, let alone in hip-hop. Like all the best records, the album is a self-contained universe, a window into DELS world that draws you gratefully in.

The album is also highly visual, casually littered with striking images. ‘The most ritualistic thing I did whilst I wrote the songs was pinning up visuals around me for inspiration. I’d often have movies that have meant so much to me over the years, like Akira, Blade Runner, Alien and The Shining, on in the background with no sound,’ DELS says. ‘I also had a few of my own landscape portraits and illustrations pinned up on the walls too.’

Petals Have Fallen is one of the first classic albums from a scene of musicians that has been years in the making, and marks a true resurgence of artistically worthwhile but viscerally thrilling music from London.

"I met most of the artists and producers that contributed to this album on MySpace back in 2005," DELS remembers. We had a page called “Loners", where myself and the likes of Kwes, Micachu, Ghostpoet, Sampha, Coby Sey, Elan Tamara were all featured – way before anybody knew who we were. We always said that we'd do a proper album together eventually. Petals Have Fallen is probably the closest thing to that collaborative album happening to date’

Petals Have Fallen is a classic album from this astonishing musician, and his talented crop of friends.

Kieren Gallear aka DELS is a new type of rapper (which is another way of saying that he’s more than just a rapper). Applying the kind of attention to detail, micro-management and macro-vision which Jay-Z used to build a business empire, DELS makes art. Popular art mind you, but art all the same, an album of emotional peaks, musical innovation and surreal, brilliant lyrics, held together by a strong, unique vision.

Gallear “never set out to be a rapper. It just happened. I was always obsessed with words. I was always cutting out random letterforms from newspapers or books because I liked the way that they sat on the page visually. This lead to me scribbling random thoughts into the back of school books and eventually picking up the mic to record those thoughts on a beat. I loved the freedom of how words can sit together in hip hop.”

An early break came when Suffolk resident John Peel heard DELS and his crew rapping at a local event and asked them to come on to his show on Radio 1. Ten years later and Gallear was back recording a session for the DJ’s spiritual heir at the station, Huw Stephens. But the intervening decade wasn’t wasted on selling weed, or unemployment, or running with a gang or any of the cliches of “urban” music. In his methodical, thoughtful way, Gallear put his efforts into his education. “Studying illustration, film, photography and Graphic Design. Attempting to forge a career within the arts, which then led to me combining it all with my music. ‘I’d been working on GOB since 2007, behind the scenes,” he says of his 2011 debut LP.

Gallear worked with three complementary but very different producers on his debut album. One of the people listening in on that Peel session was Joe Goddard, then of an unknown band called Hot Chip. He got in touch and the two began working together, cementing a friendship which finds its pinnacle in their collaborations on GOB. Micachu, on the other hand, is best known for her work with her band The Shapes, their classification as “indie” largely ignoring her classical training and long-term interest in grime. Kwes, recently signed to Warp Records in his own right, has worked with Damon Albarn, The XX, The Invisible and Speech Debelle. “They all provided me with challenging, but very inspiring music that enabled me to roam free creatively,” DELS explains. “Kwes, Joe Goddard and Micachu helped me shape a sound that is very difficult to box within one specific genre tag, which is exactly what I wanted with that album. I wanted the music to take on a life of it’s own. And not take itself too seriously!”

After the record's release, Gallear went on the road with a three piece band which completely re-wrote the rules of live hip hop, finding a sound which was as near to New Order as it was to the Roots. He has toured all over Europe, playing festivals and clubs and developing further his reputation for a kind of emotional openness which is pretty much unique in hip hop. Over the last few months, DELS has begun to work furiously on a new album. The Black Salad EP, which received repeat plays from Zane Lowe, Annie Mac and Huw Stephens at Radio 1, is a taster of what's to come. Lead track Bird Milk made its debut in an earlier form on the Kwesachu Volume 2 mixtape and DELS is keeping the same core of collaborators while reaching out to new producers for his second album.

That album is now complete. A stunning consolidation of everything that makes DELS great, as well as a giant leap forward sonically and imaginatively, Petals Have Fallen is an ultra-modern hip-hop masterpiece.

Kwes took a more hands-on, directorial role on this record, stepping forward to executive produce the album. Other collaborators represent the renaissance of fruitful, purposeful experimental music that’s come of age in London of late. Rosie Lowe, singer, songwriter and instrumentalist, recently signed to Paul Epworth’s Wolf Tone label, lends her shimmering vocal skill to the starkly beautiful Burning Beaches. Micachu, fresh from creating one of the most startling and effective soundtracks of recent years for Jonathan Glazer’s Under the Skin, re-appears to lend her inimitable, visceral sonic genius to standout RGB.

South London avant-songstress Kerry Leatham has one of the finest voices and most original approaches to her craft that the capital has produced in recent years - she lends her considerable talent to Pulls. Add electronic music powerhouse and Ninja Tune legend Bonobo into the mix, as well as Mizz Beats, Eli-T and Kwes’ brilliant younger brother Coby Sey, and Kwes had a potent arsenal of musicians at his executive producer’s fingertips.

The album was recorded and produced in Kwes’ shipping container studio in London’s docklands, over a period of 18 months. Most of the actual writing took place in DELS’ flat in Peckham. ‘I found it difficult to write during the day,’ DELS says. ‘The songs always seemed to come together late at night as I laid bed, writing down my thoughts on my phone.’ Though this may have been a tortuous method for the writer, it’s an approach that’s delivered in spades for the listener. Petals Have Fallen is imbued with a late-night, soul-baring intimacy that’s rare on any sort of album, let alone in hip-hop. Like all the best records, the album is a self-contained universe, a window into DELS world that draws you gratefully in.

The album is also highly visual, casually littered with striking images. ‘The most ritualistic thing I did whilst I wrote the songs was pinning up visuals around me for inspiration. I’d often have movies that have meant so much to me over the years, like Akira, Blade Runner, Alien and The Shining, on in the background with no sound,’ DELS says. ‘I also had a few of my own landscape portraits and illustrations pinned up on the walls too.’

Petals Have Fallen is one of the first classic albums from a scene of musicians that has been years in the making, and marks a true resurgence of artistically worthwhile but viscerally thrilling music from London.

"I met most of the artists and producers that contributed to this album on MySpace back in 2005," DELS remembers. We had a page called “Loners", where myself and the likes of Kwes, Micachu, Ghostpoet, Sampha, Coby Sey, Elan Tamara were all featured – way before anybody knew who we were. We always said that we'd do a proper album together eventually. Petals Have Fallen is probably the closest thing to that collaborative album happening to date’

Petals Have Fallen is a classic album from this astonishing musician, and his talented crop of friends.

Young Fathers were christened in 2008, named after the fact that all three members were named for their fathers..

They are:

‘G’ Hastings, from Drylaw, Edinburgh, Alloysious Massaquoi, originally from Liberia via Ghana and Kayus Bankole, born in Edinburgh to Nigerian parents but partially raised in Maryland in the USA, all 27 years old. Their live shows are complimented by Steven Morrison (drums & DJ) and Lauren Holt (AKA LAWholt - vocals).

The group formed after meeting at an under-16s hiphop night at the infamous Bongo Club in Edinburgh when they were all 14 years old. Almost immediately they started writing and recording together, initially on an old karoake machine plugged into a cheap cassette recorderat G’s parents house.

After going through various guises over several years and after hooking up with a local production company, they eventually settled on the name Young Fathers and recorded their first album with Tim Brinkhurst (AKA London) as producer. The recordings included their first single, Straight Back On It, which was given a limited release in 2009 and was received well enough to get them a couple of TV appearances, plays on BBC radio, some festival dates and the support slots with Simian Mobile Disco and Esser on UK tours.

Straight Back On It, a bang-on-the-money pop song built around Afrika Bambaataa’s reworking of Kraftwerk, was indicative of the rest of the album, Inconceivable Child… Conceived, in as much as the album was a state of the art teenage pop collection. Unfortunately the album was never released; however, another single, separately recorded, Automatic, was given a limited online release, but failed to have much impact.

In 2011 and after writing and recording yet another, unreleased album, the group decided a radical change was necessary and they finally disconnected themselves from the local production company and took control of their destiny. Recording mini-album (or ‘mixtape’ as it was called) TAPE ONE in just over a week, finishing a track a day and having it available for download within two weeks of recording gave them renewed vigour. They quickly followed this up by recording TAPE TWO in a similar fashion. Los Angeles based alt-hiphop label, Anticon, discovered them online and within a few months had signed them up for a short deal that saw both TAPEs officially released in 2013.

The group, meanwhile, continued to tour, gathering an impressive reputation as a fierce live act. They played all over Europe and made their US debut at SxSW in Austin, Texas, in March 2013.

Following support from the BBC’s Zane Lowe and Lauren Laverne, and an appearance on influential USA talk show, Jimmy Kimmel in 2014, TAPE TWO won Scottish Album Of The Year (‘The SAY Award’) and this was followed by their latest album, DEAD, released this time on Anticon in the USA and Big Dada in the UK and Europe, receiving the Mercury Award for best album of 2014. They won as the underdogs and there was a minor controversy because they didn’t look particularly joyful at the presentation and because they refused to speak to some of the more right wing press covering the event.

Immediately after winning the Mercury, YFs travelled to Berlin where they continued making their new album in a freezing basement in a building near the railway yards. Returning to the more familiar (and warmer) basement studio in Edinburgh where most of their recordings were made, to finish the album, they ended 2014 by playing a home town show at Edinburgh’s Hogmanay New year’s Eve festival in front of several thousand people.

The new album, White Men Are Black Men Too, has been recorded at various places around the world, including Melbourne and London as well as Berlin and Edinburgh and features the Leith Congregational Choir on a couple of tracks.

Young Fathers played over 140 shows during 2014, including On Blackheath Festival (curated by Massive Attack). They toured the UK, large swathes of Europe and did a six week stint in the USA. The new year already has them booked to play even more. White Men Are Black Men Too is due for release in April.

Young Fathers were christened in 2008, named after the fact that all three members were named for their fathers..

They are:

‘G’ Hastings, from Drylaw, Edinburgh, Alloysious Massaquoi, originally from Liberia via Ghana and Kayus Bankole, born in Edinburgh to Nigerian parents but partially raised in Maryland in the USA, all 27 years old. Their live shows are complimented by Steven Morrison (drums & DJ) and Lauren Holt (AKA LAWholt - vocals).

The group formed after meeting at an under-16s hiphop night at the infamous Bongo Club in Edinburgh when they were all 14 years old. Almost immediately they started writing and recording together, initially on an old karoake machine plugged into a cheap cassette recorderat G’s parents house.

After going through various guises over several years and after hooking up with a local production company, they eventually settled on the name Young Fathers and recorded their first album with Tim Brinkhurst (AKA London) as producer. The recordings included their first single, Straight Back On It, which was given a limited release in 2009 and was received well enough to get them a couple of TV appearances, plays on BBC radio, some festival dates and the support slots with Simian Mobile Disco and Esser on UK tours.

Straight Back On It, a bang-on-the-money pop song built around Afrika Bambaataa’s reworking of Kraftwerk, was indicative of the rest of the album, Inconceivable Child… Conceived, in as much as the album was a state of the art teenage pop collection. Unfortunately the album was never released; however, another single, separately recorded, Automatic, was given a limited online release, but failed to have much impact.

In 2011 and after writing and recording yet another, unreleased album, the group decided a radical change was necessary and they finally disconnected themselves from the local production company and took control of their destiny. Recording mini-album (or ‘mixtape’ as it was called) TAPE ONE in just over a week, finishing a track a day and having it available for download within two weeks of recording gave them renewed vigour. They quickly followed this up by recording TAPE TWO in a similar fashion. Los Angeles based alt-hiphop label, Anticon, discovered them online and within a few months had signed them up for a short deal that saw both TAPEs officially released in 2013.

The group, meanwhile, continued to tour, gathering an impressive reputation as a fierce live act. They played all over Europe and made their US debut at SxSW in Austin, Texas, in March 2013.

Following support from the BBC’s Zane Lowe and Lauren Laverne, and an appearance on influential USA talk show, Jimmy Kimmel in 2014, TAPE TWO won Scottish Album Of The Year (‘The SAY Award’) and this was followed by their latest album, DEAD, released this time on Anticon in the USA and Big Dada in the UK and Europe, receiving the Mercury Award for best album of 2014. They won as the underdogs and there was a minor controversy because they didn’t look particularly joyful at the presentation and because they refused to speak to some of the more right wing press covering the event.

Immediately after winning the Mercury, YFs travelled to Berlin where they continued making their new album in a freezing basement in a building near the railway yards. Returning to the more familiar (and warmer) basement studio in Edinburgh where most of their recordings were made, to finish the album, they ended 2014 by playing a home town show at Edinburgh’s Hogmanay New year’s Eve festival in front of several thousand people.

The new album, White Men Are Black Men Too, has been recorded at various places around the world, including Melbourne and London as well as Berlin and Edinburgh and features the Leith Congregational Choir on a couple of tracks.

Young Fathers played over 140 shows during 2014, including On Blackheath Festival (curated by Massive Attack). They toured the UK, large swathes of Europe and did a six week stint in the USA. The new year already has them booked to play even more. White Men Are Black Men Too is due for release in April.

Kate Tempest started out when she was 16, rapping at strangers on night busses and pestering mc's to let her on the mic at raves. Ten years later she is a published playwright, novelist, poet and respected recording artist. Her work includes Balance, her first album with band Sound of Rum; Everything Speaks in its Own Way her first collection of poems, the critically acclaimed playsWasted, Glasshouse and Hopelessly Devoted. Brand New Ancients, her self-performed epic poem to a live score, won the Ted Hughes prize 2013 and the Herald Angel at Edinburgh Fringe.It has sold out tours in the UK and New York and is published by Picador. Her second collection of poetry, Hold Your Own, will be published by Picador on October 2014. Her debut novel, The Bricks That Built The Houses, sold in a highly competitive auction to Bloomsbury and will be published in territories including the UK, US, France, Holland and Brazil in Spring 2015. Excitingly, each track on the record correlates with a chapter in the novel, in a groundbreaking cross-genre experience.

Her single Our Town, with producers letthemusicplay was recently released on Greco-Roman records. Kate has featured on songs with Sinead O Connor, Bastille, the King Blues, Damien Dempsey and Landslide. She has toured extensively, supporting Billy Bragg on his UK tour, as well as supporting Scroobius Pip, Femi Kuti, Saul Williams and John Cooper Clarke. She is 2 x slam winner at the prestigious Nu-Yorican poetry cafe in New York and has played all the major UK and European music festivals either solo or with Sound of Rum. She's headlined Latitude festival and has been featured on the BBC's Glastonbury highlights, Channel 4, BBC Radio 1,4 and 6, as well as XFM and the Charlie Rose Show (Bloomberg) in the US.

Kate's new album Everybody Down is released in May 2014 on Big Dada records. It was produced by Dan Carey aka Mr Dan who is one of the UK’s best known and most highly-rated producers. When the two met, Carey invited Tempest to come through to his South London studio to muck about on a track or two. In a burst of intense creativity, they put down the whole twelve track album in a fortnight having spent almost a year developing the characters and story. Kate is currently working on a new collection of poems, (to be published by Picador in 2014).

Kate Tempest started out when she was 16, rapping at strangers on night busses and pestering mc's to let her on the mic at raves. Ten years later she is a published playwright, novelist, poet and respected recording artist. Her work includes Balance, her first album with band Sound of Rum; Everything Speaks in its Own Way her first collection of poems, the critically acclaimed playsWasted, Glasshouse and Hopelessly Devoted. Brand New Ancients, her self-performed epic poem to a live score, won the Ted Hughes prize 2013 and the Herald Angel at Edinburgh Fringe.It has sold out tours in the UK and New York and is published by Picador. Her second collection of poetry, Hold Your Own, will be published by Picador on October 2014. Her debut novel, The Bricks That Built The Houses, sold in a highly competitive auction to Bloomsbury and will be published in territories including the UK, US, France, Holland and Brazil in Spring 2015. Excitingly, each track on the record correlates with a chapter in the novel, in a groundbreaking cross-genre experience.

Her single Our Town, with producers letthemusicplay was recently released on Greco-Roman records. Kate has featured on songs with Sinead O Connor, Bastille, the King Blues, Damien Dempsey and Landslide. She has toured extensively, supporting Billy Bragg on his UK tour, as well as supporting Scroobius Pip, Femi Kuti, Saul Williams and John Cooper Clarke. She is 2 x slam winner at the prestigious Nu-Yorican poetry cafe in New York and has played all the major UK and European music festivals either solo or with Sound of Rum. She's headlined Latitude festival and has been featured on the BBC's Glastonbury highlights, Channel 4, BBC Radio 1,4 and 6, as well as XFM and the Charlie Rose Show (Bloomberg) in the US.

Kate's new album Everybody Down is released in May 2014 on Big Dada records. It was produced by Dan Carey aka Mr Dan who is one of the UK’s best known and most highly-rated producers. When the two met, Carey invited Tempest to come through to his South London studio to muck about on a track or two. In a burst of intense creativity, they put down the whole twelve track album in a fortnight having spent almost a year developing the characters and story. Kate is currently working on a new collection of poems, (to be published by Picador in 2014).

In 2012, a striking new voice emerged from the wider surge of electronic music in the U.S. ODESZA’s Summer’s Gone stood out from the crowd; it was a collection of songs, not just beats; and its irresistible, startling dreaminess, addictive drums and fathoms-deep bass set it apart from the by-the-numbers brutality of EDM’s also-rans. In an age of manufactured internet buzz and carefully plotted hype, ODESZA’s story was refreshingly authentic: A brilliant new duo unveiled their music on the internet, and the world paid attention.

Harrison Mills (aka CatacombKid) and Clayton Knight (aka BeachesBeaches) began recording together after meeting at Western Washington University. There was instant chemistry, and the pair worked prolifically, quickly carving out a distinctive, heady sound: glitched-out vocals, soaring, visceral melody and ear-gripping drums. Two songs from Summer’s Gone – “How Did I Get Here” and “iPlayYouListen” – instantly leapt to number 1 on the Hype Machine Popular Chart. ODESZA began to make evangelical fans, with word of their music setting the world – both real and virtual – alight.

2013 saw the release of the My Friends Never Die EP, with three of the five tracks hitting #1 on Hype Machine. Relentless touring followed, including dates with Pretty Lights and Emancipator and numerous festival performances including Sasquatch Music Festival and Lightning In A Bottle. Thrown in at the deep end, ODESZA quickly honed a live craft to match that of their recordings.

The duo was playing to larger and larger crowds when Pretty Lights asked them to be the support act on the fall Pretty Lights tour, and to remix "One Day They'll Know," which also hit #1 on Hype Machine and #8 on the iTunes Electronic Chart. Later in 2013, ODESZA selected their favourite producers for a follow up remix EP, My Friends Never Die Remixes, and launched the ambitious, ongoing mixtape series NO.SLEEP.

February 2014 brought the release of the ODESZA single “Sun Models (feat. Madelyn Grant,)” taken from the duo’s forthcoming second album. This song continued the trend they’d set previously, and it too hit #1 on Hype Machine. In March 2014 ODESZA’s remix of Pretty Lights’ “Lost And Found” was released on the DIVERGENT movie soundtrack, and (you guessed it!) hit #1 on Hype Machine.

Harrison and Clayton headed back into the studio, putting the finishes touches to their forthcoming second album, before setting out on a sold out North American tour in Spring, culminating in a performance at Coachella. Not wanting to leave their growing legion of fans wanting, the duo’s remix of ZHU’s hit “Faded” was released, taking their #1s on the Hype Machine chart straight into double figures.

Summer 2014 saw ODESZA visit Australia to play a series of live dates, before heading back to North America for festivals, and to polish up and master their now hotly anticipated sophomore album.

And finally that brand new album is here. In Return has more than just delivered on the promise of ODESZA’s previous work. A record with a precocious maturity and coherence, it’s a start-to-finish stunner of pop-infused, electronic wonder, littered with infectious hooks and potent atmosphere. Vocal performances from Zyra, Py and Shy Girls accompany that of Madelyn Grant on Sun Models, expertly worked into ODESZA’s trademark, mood-altering uplift.

ODESZA developed a new live performance to accompany In Return, ensuring that the shows do full justice to the album. Their work ethic and constant evolution resulted in a sold out headline tour of North America this fall and has set them up for a successful first European tour. 2015 brings an even more ambitious live production which ODESZA will unveil at every major music festival across the United States.

One of the stunning aspects of ODESZA is the speed with which they’ve created a large, devoted fanbase – testament to just how refreshing, immediate and exciting their music is. To date, ODESZA has earned 16 Hype Machine #1s, amassed over 35 million SoundCloud streams and 15.3 million Spotify plays in the last 60 days, and been licensed by Adidas, GoPro, Piz Buin and many more. In Return debuted at #1 on the Billboard Electronic chart, #42 on the Billboard Top 200 chart, # 1 on the iTunes Electronic Chart where it spent 15 days in a row, cracked the iTunes Electronic Chart Top 10 in 7 other countries outside the U.S., and reached #20 on the iTunes Overall Albums chart. Their breakout single, "Say My Name (feat. Zyra)," reached #1 on the Hype Machine popular chart twice, #1 on the Spotify US Viral Chart, #2 on the Spotify Global Chart and was named iTunes Single of the Week in many countries around the globe. The “Say My Name” video was named a Vimeo staff pick and saw airplay on MTV Hits, MTVU and Fuse. ODESZA has also been commissioned to make remixes for Charli XCX, Angus & Julia Stone and many more to come.

That’s a lot of people paying attention! In Return is everything fans might have hoped for and then some: An album that places ODESZA firmly in the vanguard of electronic music’s coming of age.

“Despite the many voices featured on the album, the sound is unified under a groove, built on ODESZA’s multi-layered melodies, spaced-out beats and cinematic charm.” - TIME

“Every track off of their latest album In Return hangs between blithe, ethereal spaces and thumping percussion, like fuzzy clouds punctuated by dope-ass thunder. The duo keep things unpredictable, never relying on same beat for too long, their music making you feel as if you’re being teleported into the future that's nostalgic for the past.” - Noisey

“Mixed in with their classic approach are a number of choice guest appearances and snazzy experiments that push the limits of their sound.” - Seattle Times

“There’s a certain finger-on-the-pulse feeling with ODESZA. Their grasp on the direction of electronic music sets them apart and they’re becoming the gold standard of acts born from sounds exchanged on the internet.” - Paste Magazine

“ODESZA has already demonstrated the ability to take root in the future and garage house genre as a power team to watch, and continues to showcase their forward thinking ear for the genre’s sound.” - Dancing Astronaut

In 2012, a striking new voice emerged from the wider surge of electronic music in the U.S. ODESZA’s Summer’s Gone stood out from the crowd; it was a collection of songs, not just beats; and its irresistible, startling dreaminess, addictive drums and fathoms-deep bass set it apart from the by-the-numbers brutality of EDM’s also-rans. In an age of manufactured internet buzz and carefully plotted hype, ODESZA’s story was refreshingly authentic: A brilliant new duo unveiled their music on the internet, and the world paid attention.

Harrison Mills (aka CatacombKid) and Clayton Knight (aka BeachesBeaches) began recording together after meeting at Western Washington University. There was instant chemistry, and the pair worked prolifically, quickly carving out a distinctive, heady sound: glitched-out vocals, soaring, visceral melody and ear-gripping drums. Two songs from Summer’s Gone – “How Did I Get Here” and “iPlayYouListen” – instantly leapt to number 1 on the Hype Machine Popular Chart. ODESZA began to make evangelical fans, with word of their music setting the world – both real and virtual – alight.

2013 saw the release of the My Friends Never Die EP, with three of the five tracks hitting #1 on Hype Machine. Relentless touring followed, including dates with Pretty Lights and Emancipator and numerous festival performances including Sasquatch Music Festival and Lightning In A Bottle. Thrown in at the deep end, ODESZA quickly honed a live craft to match that of their recordings.

The duo was playing to larger and larger crowds when Pretty Lights asked them to be the support act on the fall Pretty Lights tour, and to remix "One Day They'll Know," which also hit #1 on Hype Machine and #8 on the iTunes Electronic Chart. Later in 2013, ODESZA selected their favourite producers for a follow up remix EP, My Friends Never Die Remixes, and launched the ambitious, ongoing mixtape series NO.SLEEP.

February 2014 brought the release of the ODESZA single “Sun Models (feat. Madelyn Grant,)” taken from the duo’s forthcoming second album. This song continued the trend they’d set previously, and it too hit #1 on Hype Machine. In March 2014 ODESZA’s remix of Pretty Lights’ “Lost And Found” was released on the DIVERGENT movie soundtrack, and (you guessed it!) hit #1 on Hype Machine.

Harrison and Clayton headed back into the studio, putting the finishes touches to their forthcoming second album, before setting out on a sold out North American tour in Spring, culminating in a performance at Coachella. Not wanting to leave their growing legion of fans wanting, the duo’s remix of ZHU’s hit “Faded” was released, taking their #1s on the Hype Machine chart straight into double figures.

Summer 2014 saw ODESZA visit Australia to play a series of live dates, before heading back to North America for festivals, and to polish up and master their now hotly anticipated sophomore album.

And finally that brand new album is here. In Return has more than just delivered on the promise of ODESZA’s previous work. A record with a precocious maturity and coherence, it’s a start-to-finish stunner of pop-infused, electronic wonder, littered with infectious hooks and potent atmosphere. Vocal performances from Zyra, Py and Shy Girls accompany that of Madelyn Grant on Sun Models, expertly worked into ODESZA’s trademark, mood-altering uplift.

ODESZA developed a new live performance to accompany In Return, ensuring that the shows do full justice to the album. Their work ethic and constant evolution resulted in a sold out headline tour of North America this fall and has set them up for a successful first European tour. 2015 brings an even more ambitious live production which ODESZA will unveil at every major music festival across the United States.

One of the stunning aspects of ODESZA is the speed with which they’ve created a large, devoted fanbase – testament to just how refreshing, immediate and exciting their music is. To date, ODESZA has earned 16 Hype Machine #1s, amassed over 35 million SoundCloud streams and 15.3 million Spotify plays in the last 60 days, and been licensed by Adidas, GoPro, Piz Buin and many more. In Return debuted at #1 on the Billboard Electronic chart, #42 on the Billboard Top 200 chart, # 1 on the iTunes Electronic Chart where it spent 15 days in a row, cracked the iTunes Electronic Chart Top 10 in 7 other countries outside the U.S., and reached #20 on the iTunes Overall Albums chart. Their breakout single, "Say My Name (feat. Zyra)," reached #1 on the Hype Machine popular chart twice, #1 on the Spotify US Viral Chart, #2 on the Spotify Global Chart and was named iTunes Single of the Week in many countries around the globe. The “Say My Name” video was named a Vimeo staff pick and saw airplay on MTV Hits, MTVU and Fuse. ODESZA has also been commissioned to make remixes for Charli XCX, Angus & Julia Stone and many more to come.

That’s a lot of people paying attention! In Return is everything fans might have hoped for and then some: An album that places ODESZA firmly in the vanguard of electronic music’s coming of age.

“Despite the many voices featured on the album, the sound is unified under a groove, built on ODESZA’s multi-layered melodies, spaced-out beats and cinematic charm.” - TIME

“Every track off of their latest album In Return hangs between blithe, ethereal spaces and thumping percussion, like fuzzy clouds punctuated by dope-ass thunder. The duo keep things unpredictable, never relying on same beat for too long, their music making you feel as if you’re being teleported into the future that's nostalgic for the past.” - Noisey

“Mixed in with their classic approach are a number of choice guest appearances and snazzy experiments that push the limits of their sound.” - Seattle Times

“There’s a certain finger-on-the-pulse feeling with ODESZA. Their grasp on the direction of electronic music sets them apart and they’re becoming the gold standard of acts born from sounds exchanged on the internet.” - Paste Magazine

“ODESZA has already demonstrated the ability to take root in the future and garage house genre as a power team to watch, and continues to showcase their forward thinking ear for the genre’s sound.” - Dancing Astronaut

In 2012, a striking new voice emerged from the wider surge of electronic music in the U.S. ODESZA’s Summer’s Gone stood out from the crowd; it was a collection of songs, not just beats; and its irresistible, startling dreaminess, addictive drums and fathoms-deep bass set it apart from the by-the-numbers brutality of EDM’s also-rans. In an age of manufactured internet buzz and carefully plotted hype, ODESZA’s story was refreshingly authentic: A brilliant new duo unveiled their music on the internet, and the world paid attention.

Harrison Mills (aka CatacombKid) and Clayton Knight (aka BeachesBeaches) began recording together after meeting at Western Washington University. There was instant chemistry, and the pair worked prolifically, quickly carving out a distinctive, heady sound: glitched-out vocals, soaring, visceral melody and ear-gripping drums. Two songs from Summer’s Gone – “How Did I Get Here” and “iPlayYouListen” – instantly leapt to number 1 on the Hype Machine Popular Chart. ODESZA began to make evangelical fans, with word of their music setting the world – both real and virtual – alight.

2013 saw the release of the My Friends Never Die EP, with three of the five tracks hitting #1 on Hype Machine. Relentless touring followed, including dates with Pretty Lights and Emancipator and numerous festival performances including Sasquatch Music Festival and Lightning In A Bottle. Thrown in at the deep end, ODESZA quickly honed a live craft to match that of their recordings.

The duo was playing to larger and larger crowds when Pretty Lights asked them to be the support act on the fall Pretty Lights tour, and to remix "One Day They'll Know," which also hit #1 on Hype Machine and #8 on the iTunes Electronic Chart. Later in 2013, ODESZA selected their favourite producers for a follow up remix EP, My Friends Never Die Remixes, and launched the ambitious, ongoing mixtape series NO.SLEEP.

February 2014 brought the release of the ODESZA single “Sun Models (feat. Madelyn Grant,)” taken from the duo’s forthcoming second album. This song continued the trend they’d set previously, and it too hit #1 on Hype Machine. In March 2014 ODESZA’s remix of Pretty Lights’ “Lost And Found” was released on the DIVERGENT movie soundtrack, and (you guessed it!) hit #1 on Hype Machine.

Harrison and Clayton headed back into the studio, putting the finishes touches to their forthcoming second album, before setting out on a sold out North American tour in Spring, culminating in a performance at Coachella. Not wanting to leave their growing legion of fans wanting, the duo’s remix of ZHU’s hit “Faded” was released, taking their #1s on the Hype Machine chart straight into double figures.

Summer 2014 saw ODESZA visit Australia to play a series of live dates, before heading back to North America for festivals, and to polish up and master their now hotly anticipated sophomore album.

And finally that brand new album is here. In Return has more than just delivered on the promise of ODESZA’s previous work. A record with a precocious maturity and coherence, it’s a start-to-finish stunner of pop-infused, electronic wonder, littered with infectious hooks and potent atmosphere. Vocal performances from Zyra, Py and Shy Girls accompany that of Madelyn Grant on Sun Models, expertly worked into ODESZA’s trademark, mood-altering uplift.

ODESZA developed a new live performance to accompany In Return, ensuring that the shows do full justice to the album. Their work ethic and constant evolution resulted in a sold out headline tour of North America this fall and has set them up for a successful first European tour. 2015 brings an even more ambitious live production which ODESZA will unveil at every major music festival across the United States.

One of the stunning aspects of ODESZA is the speed with which they’ve created a large, devoted fanbase – testament to just how refreshing, immediate and exciting their music is. To date, ODESZA has earned 16 Hype Machine #1s, amassed over 35 million SoundCloud streams and 15.3 million Spotify plays in the last 60 days, and been licensed by Adidas, GoPro, Piz Buin and many more. In Return debuted at #1 on the Billboard Electronic chart, #42 on the Billboard Top 200 chart, # 1 on the iTunes Electronic Chart where it spent 15 days in a row, cracked the iTunes Electronic Chart Top 10 in 7 other countries outside the U.S., and reached #20 on the iTunes Overall Albums chart. Their breakout single, "Say My Name (feat. Zyra)," reached #1 on the Hype Machine popular chart twice, #1 on the Spotify US Viral Chart, #2 on the Spotify Global Chart and was named iTunes Single of the Week in many countries around the globe. The “Say My Name” video was named a Vimeo staff pick and saw airplay on MTV Hits, MTVU and Fuse. ODESZA has also been commissioned to make remixes for Charli XCX, Angus & Julia Stone and many more to come.

That’s a lot of people paying attention! In Return is everything fans might have hoped for and then some: An album that places ODESZA firmly in the vanguard of electronic music’s coming of age.

“Despite the many voices featured on the album, the sound is unified under a groove, built on ODESZA’s multi-layered melodies, spaced-out beats and cinematic charm.” - TIME

“Every track off of their latest album In Return hangs between blithe, ethereal spaces and thumping percussion, like fuzzy clouds punctuated by dope-ass thunder. The duo keep things unpredictable, never relying on same beat for too long, their music making you feel as if you’re being teleported into the future that's nostalgic for the past.” - Noisey

“Mixed in with their classic approach are a number of choice guest appearances and snazzy experiments that push the limits of their sound.” - Seattle Times

“There’s a certain finger-on-the-pulse feeling with ODESZA. Their grasp on the direction of electronic music sets them apart and they’re becoming the gold standard of acts born from sounds exchanged on the internet.” - Paste Magazine

“ODESZA has already demonstrated the ability to take root in the future and garage house genre as a power team to watch, and continues to showcase their forward thinking ear for the genre’s sound.” - Dancing Astronaut